China's social security system framework takes shape

Taxi driver Wang Guanghe is a farmer in Beijing suburb. He said everyone in his village has had a medical insurance with each paying 10-yuan premium per month and the town and county governments contributing another 10 yuan for each person.

"With medical insurance we feel much more secure. If there is also the endowment insurance that would be even better." he said.

Experts said the reform and development of social security system benefit from China's world-focus achievements in economy as well as the stable social environment created by social security.

In 1993 China put forward the goal of establishing a socialist market economy system, which makes social security system an important part of the system, and clarified the goals and tasks for the social security system construction. During ten years or so of reform China implemented a basic system that combines social pooling and personal account, set up a multi-level social security system framework. Through individual payment, enhancing government finance investment and establishing national social security funds China has basically formed state, enterprise and individual multiple-funded mechanisms

China's social security system consists of social insurance, social welfare, special care and placement, social assistance and housing support etc. Social insurance is the core of social security system, which consists of endowment insurance, unemployment insurance, medical insurance, industrial injury insurance and maternity insurance.

In order to solve the problem of basic living security for the general public during the economic transition process the Chinese government adopted a group of effective measures to ensure basic living for the 28 million laid-off workers from state-owned enterprises, unemployment benefits for the 8 million unemployed, basic pensions paid on time and in full for the 36 million retirees and subsistence allowances for the 22 million-odd urban population living under the poverty line.

The government pays high attention to expanding social security overage, said Wang Dongjin, Vice Minister of the Ministry of Labor and Social Security. Currently the social security coverage has gradually expanded from state-owned workers to embrace personnel engaged in various economic organizations in urban areas. In some areas experiments are being conducted on social security such as rural endowment insurance, new rural cooperative health care and subsistence allowances for rural residents.

The task of perfecting China's social security system is very difficult and heavy because China has a large population, the economic development level is relatively low and development among different regions and between the urban and rural areas is imbalanced, Wang Dongjin said candidly. Statistics show that people above 60 account for about 11 percent of the total Chinese population and the aging of the Chinese population would reach its peak by the 2030s. "Silver hair wave" would make the problem of endowment insurance one of the prominent difficulties in the social security system. Wang said the Chinese government is making continued efforts to perfect the endowment insurance system, reform fundraising modes and establish a multi-level endowment insurance system, in order to realize the sustainable development of the endowment insurance system.

China's basic endowment insurance originally covered only state-owned enterprises and urban collective enterprises and their employees. In 1999 China expanded the coverage to include foreign-funded companies, urban privately-run companies and other urban enterprises and their employees. In 2002 urban flexible employees were also included.

The first twenty years of the 21st century are an important opportunity for China to speed up the modernization construction. Wang said the Chinese government will, according to the requirement of scientific development view and centered on the goal of building a relatively affluent society in a comprehensive way, stick to putting people first; plan as a whole employment, reemployment and labor relations and various social security works; accelerate the construction of a relatively complete social security system that is adaptive to the economic development and consistent with the requirement of socialist market economy system to enable more people to enjoy the social security.

The 28th Global Conference of the International Social Security Association is being held in Beijing. Wang, Dongjin hopes to intensify the exchange and cooperation between China and other countries in the field of social security through this conference and promote the development of China's social security undertaking.

By People's Daily Online