Older Voters Demand Leadership on Social Security From Next President: AARP Poll

American voters look for certain qualities in candidates for the presidency, and in a poll released Thursday by AARP, nine in 10 voters said leadership was a very important one.

Eighty-two percent of voters 50 and older in the survey said a basic threshold for presidential leadership was having a plan for Social Security.

Seventy-seven percent of voters wanted candidates to lay out their plans to update Social Security for future generations. Respondents across party lines agreed on this point: Democrats, 78%; Independents, 77%; and Republicans, 76%.

So did an oversample of African-Americans, 87%, and Hispanics/Latinos, 83%.

In addition, 83% of all voters said it was very important that the government take action to make Social Security sound.

“With [20% of] older voters undecided, candidates who fail to tell voters where they stand on Social Security do so at their own risk,” Executive Vice President Nancy LeaMond of AARP said in a statement.

Hart Research Associates and GS Strategy Group in late February and early March interviewed 1,659 likely 2016 general election voters age 50 and over, including an oversample of 420 African-American/black and 427 Hispanic/Latino voters.

Economy and Personal Finance