Sanders backs increasing Social Security benefits while campaigning in Iowa City

IOWA CITY - Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, campaigning in Iowa City on Sunday, called it unacceptable that Social Security recipients won't get a cost-of-living increase in their benefits this year.

Sanders called the government decision not to give seniors a cost-of-living adjustment for just the third time in four decades unfair because 'unlike the population at-large, seniors aren't spending their money on flat-screen TVs and computers that are getting cheaper.

'They spend their money on health care and prescription drugs where prices are going up,” the 74-year-old Sanders said at the Johnson County Democratic Party's fall barbecue in Iowa City.

Iowa ranks 10th in the nation in percentage of its population older than 65. Sanders said the decision means 616,000 Iowans, including 413,000 seniors - more than two-thirds of whom rely on Social Security for more than half their income - won't get a cost-of-living increase next year.

Despite that, he said, Republican presidential hopefuls want to reduce Social Security benefits and raise the retirement age.

'When millions of seniors in America are trying to survive on eleven, twelve, thirteen thousand dollars a year (in) Social Security, no we're not going to cut benefits, we are going to increase and expand,” he said.

That was just one of the planks in Sanders' economic plan to redistribute wealth from the top one-tenth of 1 percent to the middle class and working families. To accomplish that, Sanders called for a political revolution 'transforming America so we have a government that works for all of us, not just a handful of billionaires.”

He also called for tuition-free college, raising the minimum wage to a 'living wage” of $15 an hour, guaranteed paid family and medical leave, and a Medicare-for-all, single-payer health care system.

A keystone of his plan is campaign finance reform because 'so long as millionaires and billionaires can spend unbelievable sums of money trying to buy elections … we are not going to have a government that represents the middle class and working class of this country,” Sanders said.

His refusal to take money from political action committees, along with his college funding plan and commitment to equal pay for women and equal treatment for gays and lesbians, struck a chord with University of Iowa students Megan Koch and Eileen Campbell.

There's an authenticity about Sanders that Campbell finds lacking in other candidates. 'I see things in Bernie Sanders I don't see in the other Democrats,” she said.

'It's nice to hear an older person care about younger people's issues,” Koch added.

That sort of response didn't surprise longtime Democratic activist and Sanders supporter Tom Carsner of Iowa City.

'For better or worse,” he said, 'a good economic plan attracts people. That's what most people vote on. It starts with bread-and-butter issues.”

Dick Myers doesn't disagree, but he was sporting 'Hillary for Iowa” stickers.

'All the Democratic candidates are talking about the same things,” the retired Iowa City state legislator said. 'But (talking about ideas) and being there and getting things done are two different things, and I think Hillary has the background and experience to get it done.”

Sanders was the only presidential hopeful to speak at the barbecue. Clinton was represented by former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm and former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley by his state deputy director, Kristin Sosanie.