Abstract
Around the time of the founding of the PRC, the Party and the state began to establish a social security system in order to provide stability and restore the national economy devastated by war. Despite all the ups and downs throughout its evolution, including several changes in its model over those 70 years, China’s pension system has played an increasingly important role in protecting people's lives. It now covers more than 800 million people, with more than 200 million people receiving pensions each year. The number of the insured in the health insurance system has long exceeded one billion.
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Notes
- 1.
Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security of the People’s Republic of China (2017).
- 2.
Ma and Zheng (2005).
- 3.
Yan (1987).
- 4.
According to the Regulations on the Five-Guarantee Support Work in Rural Areas promulgated in 1994, the system of “five guarantees” is a safeguard system for the vulnerable in rural areas, mainly the “three have-nots” villagers who are elderly, disabled or under 16-year-old. They would be taken care of and given material assistance in the terms of food, clothing, housing, medical care, and funeral (education).
- 5.
Cui (1994).
- 6.
National Family Planning Commission, Compilation of Family Planning Documents:195020131981.3, National Family Planning Commission, 1987.
- 7.
Song (2007).
- 8.
Cited in Wen Jun, China’s Cooperative Medical Care: When Will the Glory Return, Medicine and Health Care.
- 9.
Lin (2002).
- 10.
Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (2002).
- 11.
National Bureau of Statistics, China Labor Wage Statistics (1949–1985), China Statistics Press, 1987; Ministry of Finance, China’s Financial Statistics (1950–1991), Science Press, 1992. Note: The labor insurance and welfare costs before 1957 included those for employees of public–private partnership units, cooperative units and private units.
- 12.
Yan (1987).
- 13.
National Bureau of Statistics: China Labor Statistics Yearbook 1996.
- 14.
In the first several months, it was “down to the countryside and up to the mountains”. On July 9, 1967, the People's Daily published an editorial titled Adhering to the Correct Direction of the Educated Youths Going up to the Mountains and Down to the Countryside. The name was kept in use from then on.
- 15.
Peng (2007).
- 16.
Zheng et al. (2002).
- 17.
Proposal of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on the Formulation of the Seventh Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development.
- 18.
National Bureau of Statistics. Thirty Years of Digital China: A Compilation of Statistics on 30 Years of Reform and Opening Up, 2008.
- 19.
Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security. 1995 Annual Labor Statistics Business Development.
- 20.
National Bureau of Statistics. China Labor Statistics Yearbook 2008.
- 21.
Liu (1998).
- 22.
Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security. 1999 Annual Statistical Bulletin on the Development of Labor and Social Security Cause.
- 23.
In 1993, led by the State Commission for Restructuring the Economic System, 11 departments, including the Ministry of Labor and the Ministry of Health, formed a special research group on social security system. After more than half a year of investigation, the research group submitted the Special Research Report on the Social Security System to the Central Committee and the State Council in October 1993.
- 24.
Source: China InfoBank China Statistical Database.
- 25.
Source: Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, Labor and Social Security Development Bulletin, 1998–2008.
- 26.
Source: 2008 Annual Statistical Bulletin on the Development of Human Resources and Social Security.
- 27.
National Council of Social Security Funds: 2008 Annual Report on National Social Security Fund.
- 28.
- 29.
Phoenix Information: State Council studied and deployed pilot programs on new rural social pension insurance. http://news.ifeng.com/mainland/200906/0624_17_1218258.shtml.
- 30.
Source: 2008 Annual Bulletin on Human Resources and Social Security Business Development.
- 31.
Source: 2008 Annual Bulletin on Human Resources and Social Security Business Development.
- 32.
Yang et al. (2006).
- 33.
See the Notice on Issues Related to the Employees in the Railway System Participating in Basic Health insurance (Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs [1999] No. 20).
- 34.
See Guiding Opinions on Urban Workers of Flexible Employment Participating in Basic Health insurance (No. 10 [2003] of the Department of Labor and Social Affairs) and Opinions on Promoting Participation in Health insurance by Employees of Diversified Ownership Enterprises and Non-public Economic Organizations (No. 5 [2004] of the Department of Labor and Social Affairs).
- 35.
Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security. 2007 Statistical Bulletin on the Development of Labor and Social Security.
- 36.
Source: Ministry of Health, website: http://www.moh.gov.cn/publicfiles//business/htmlfiles/zwgkzt/pwstj/index.htm.
- 37.
Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security. 1999 Annual Bulletin on Labor and Social Security Development and 2008 Annual Bulletin on Human Resources and Social Security Development Statistics.
- 38.
Calculated based on data from the 2008 Annual Statistical Bulletin on Human Resources and Social Security Development.
- 39.
Source: Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, Bulletin of Labor and Social Security Development in previous years.
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Zhang, Y. (2024). Evolution of China’s Social Insurance System. In: Social Development and Social Changes in China . Research Series on the Chinese Dream and China’s Development Path. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-97-1184-0_6
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