During a May Day rally speech on Thursday, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) promoted defined benefit pension plans for workers.
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00:00Now, our Republican colleagues, or some of them, want to cut Social Security.
00:1222%, if you can believe this, of seniors in this country are trying to get by on 15,000 a year or less.
00:21Can't afford to heat their homes, pay for their prescription drugs.
00:25We're not going to cut Social Security.
00:27Brothers and sisters together, we're going to expand Social Security benefits
00:34by lifting the cap on taxable incomes.
00:39Let me tell you something else.
00:41I am old enough to remember something called a defined benefit pension plan.
00:49You know what that is?
00:51I know it's a radical idea to the younger people.
00:54Once upon a time, when workers worked at a decent job, when they retired, they had a strong, defined pension plan.
01:05We've got to bring that back.
01:07People who worked their whole lives should be able to retire with dignity.
01:16Brothers and sisters, we are the only major country on earth not to guarantee health care to all as a human right.
01:2685 million are uninsured or underinsured, and we spend twice as much per capita on health care as the people of any other major country.
01:41The function of health care is not to make insurance companies and drug companies rich.
01:48It's to provide health care to all.
01:51Together, we're going to pass Medicare for All single-payer program.
01:56Donald Trump may think that climate change is a hoax.
02:07You and I know that it is an existential threat.
02:11We can create millions of good-paying union jobs by transforming our energy system into energy efficiency and sustainable energy.
02:28And brothers and sisters, instead of spending a trillion dollars a year on the military,
02:35instead of giving billions of dollars to Netanyahu and its horrific war against the people of Gaza,
02:47we can cut military spending and build five million units of low-income and affordable housing.
03:00Now, I'm not going to tell you that the struggle in front of us is easy.
03:05The oligarchs own the economy.
03:08They own the media.
03:10They own the political process.
03:12That's the reality.
03:14And I may not have a PhD in mathematics, but there is one thing I do understand.
03:22That if we do not allow Trump and his friends to divide us up by the color of our skin,
03:30or where we were born, or our sexual orientation,
03:35if we stand together around a progressive agenda,
03:41if we start electing candidates who work for us and not the billionaire class,
03:51if we think big and not small,
03:58brothers and sisters, there is nothing we cannot accomplish.
04:03Let's go out. Let's do it. Let's transform the country.
04:08Thank you all very much.