China's social security system is a system in which the government and society provide material assistance to citizens in old age, illness, disability, unemployment, childbirth, death, disasters and difficulties in life according to law to ensure their basic living needs. Social security system is one of the basic systems of the country. The state must formulate social security laws and regulations to ensure that the social security system is truly implemented.
Logically speaking, the establishment of any system should be designed before construction, at least there should be a framework before construction. However, the construction of social security system in China has always lacked long-term overall consideration when the original design is obviously abandoned. To a certain extent, it has become a top priority of China's social policy to make a macro-examination of the whole social security system in China.
First, the existing problems and causes analysis
From a simple observation, in recent ten years, especially after the task of economic system transformation was clearly put forward, the overall design of China's social security system has experienced a relatively obvious change process.
1993 The Decision on Establishing a Socialist Market Economic System adopted by the Third Plenary Session of the 14th CPC Central Committee first expounded the composition of China's social security system in the new period, pointing out that China's social security system includes social insurance, social relief, social welfare, special care and placement, social mutual assistance and personal savings accumulation. Later, in 1995 and 1996, the documents of the Central Committee and the National People's Congress on the ninth five-year plan for economic and social development and the long-term goal of 20 10 reiterated this view. However, since 1998, with the establishment of the Ministry of Labor and Social Security, the connotation and extension of the word "social security" in official documents have changed greatly. In the past, the term "six parts" not only never appeared in official documents, but was actually completely abandoned. Instead, it was "to make the social insurance system, the basic living security system for laid-off workers and the minimum living security system for urban residents connect and complement each other." Constantly improve the social security system "(see Zhong Fa [1998] 10" Notice of Central the State Council on Doing a Good Job in Basic Living Security and Re-employment of Laid-off Workers from State-owned Enterprises ") has further evolved into" three security lines ". Because the "three security lines" are considered as "an important part of the social security system with China characteristics under the current conditions", they are not the whole social security system, and official documents have never published any discussion on the composition of a complete social security system, so the overall framework of the whole social security system with China characteristics is suspended.
Because the fundamental problem of the overall framework of social security system in China has been unresolved for a long time, there are some obvious problems in the practice of social security system construction in China. To sum up, these problems mainly include: First, the use of concepts and some formulations are quite confusing, and the nature of many safety projects is unclear, the objectives are inaccurate, and there are no specific implementation steps. For example, social security, social welfare and social insurance overlap and are often mixed together; The objects of "three noes" and "five guarantees" are essentially social assistance but are called social welfare; Housing assistance has evolved into a new social welfare in practice; Social insurance has a strong welfare; Issuing lottery tickets is defined as an important means to make up for the lack of government finance; Some people put forward the slogan of social welfare and industrialization of the cause of aging, and so on. Second, there is a lack of communication and coordination between departments, systems, and superiors and subordinates, which leads to a weak hierarchy and fragmentation of the whole social security system. Even the degree to which a certain security system is valued will change with the size of political voices of different social groups, the power of departments or the personal influence of a leader. Similar examples are too numerous to mention. Third, the characteristics of non-institutionalization are very obvious. Concentrated on: the level of legalization is not high, even the existing laws and regulations are seriously lacking in law enforcement, and the guarantee system is difficult to implement; In some security projects, the responsibilities of the government, society, families and individuals are unclear, and the security effect is difficult to reach the designated position; The government functions are misplaced, the responsibilities of different departments and levels are unclear, and there are offside and absence at the same time; The fund-raising is not standardized, and there is a lack of effective supervision over the social security contributions of local finance; Insufficient mobilization of social forces and excessive dependence on social forces coexist. At the same time, the construction of the whole social security system has obvious emergency characteristics, which is manifested in piecemeal treatment, such as solving the problems of laid-off workers and retired soldiers, and solving the problem of wage arrears for public servants. Fourth, there are obvious structural defects in the whole social security system. For example, the so-called social security only covers cities but not rural areas, the social assistance system has not been paid enough attention, the social insurance level is too high and the insurance level is single, the occupational welfare has not been included in the government's vision, the family welfare system has been ignored, and the role of community security has been exaggerated. Five, the professional level of social security work needs to be improved, the outstanding performance is that there is no professional team from research to operation. The legislation of many security projects lacks the foundation of research results, and many new measures lack preliminary demonstration (such as time-saving system and volunteer system). It is difficult to evaluate the implementation of existing policies and regulations, it is difficult to establish the social work title system, and the social security specialty and discipline setting in colleges and universities is not reasonable.
Briefly analyze the reasons why the whole social security system lacks overall design and framework care, roughly as follows:
First of all, the understanding of the importance of the social security system by all parties concerned has not yet reached its due height. The reasons for this situation lie in one-sided understanding of the principle of giving priority to efficiency and giving consideration to fairness, paying attention to economic development while neglecting social development, fearing the lessons of western welfare countries, not paying enough attention to the social security system in the economic transformation design scheme put into practice, the administrative consciousness and habits of government rights and civic obligations rather than government responsibilities and civic rights, and the prejudice that China, as a big country, will have a lot of room for manoeuvre on any issue.
Secondly, many people have some deviations, mistakes and even misunderstandings about the social security system. In practice, many people use social insurance instead of the whole social security system. Some people mistakenly regard the emergency basic living security as the construction of the whole social security system, while others treat the construction of the social security system with the view that employment is the greatest guarantee, thus causing undue influence on the overall design of the social security system.
Third, some people don't know enough about the necessity and urgency of specialization and standardization of social security system. For example, some people think that China has a tradition of social mutual assistance, a traditional social relief system that is still functioning, and the government has repeatedly increased the living security funds, so there will never be people who starve to death or freeze to death, and there is no need to standardize and standardize management in strict accordance with the system requirements; Some people think that the generation of social injustice lags behind economic development for a period of time, so it is still too late to grasp the construction of social security system in a few years; Some people think that the degree of social injustice in China is far from terrible, and some scholars even think that the international Gini coefficient can be expanded, so it is a mountain out of a molehill to emphasize the construction of a complete and standardized social security system.
Second, the target model and system design
After a brief analysis of the main problems existing in the current social security system construction in China, this paper holds that the target mode and institutional framework of the social security system with China characteristics should be: taking the "remedial mode" as the goal, taking social assistance as the basis, taking social insurance as the main body and taking social welfare as the supplement.
Taking the "remedial model" as the goal means that on the basis of giving full play to the role of the market, society, units, families and individuals, the government only plays a role in the construction of social security system, and the level of security is limited to maintaining the basic living standard. The design of security system is based on the premise of not damaging the effective operation of market mechanism. According to the requirements of the "remedial model", the government only plays a minimum mandatory role in social assistance, social insurance and social welfare systems. Choosing such a social security target model is closely related to China's economic development stage, national financial capacity and the specific national conditions of China society.
On the basis of social assistance, we should put the establishment and maintenance of social assistance system in the first place in the construction of the whole social security system, and strive to establish a social assistance system with the goal of maintaining minimum survival, focusing on laid-off workers from state-owned enterprises, poor people, victims, "three noes" and "five guarantees" personnel, focusing on the minimum living security system and focusing on the emergency assistance system for victims. The main contents are the relief welfare service system, social mutual aid system and poverty alleviation and development system. With medical care, education, housing, justice and other special assistance and temporary assistance as a supplement, and a unified social assistance service network as the basic carrier, it has a social assistance system with China characteristics. The establishment of China's social security system based on social assistance is not only determined by China's national conditions, but also a concrete manifestation of the development level of China's existing social security system.
Taking social insurance as the main body is to regard the establishment and normal operation of the social insurance system as the fundamental symbol of whether the whole social security system is established and operated well, and strive to establish a social insurance system that is in line with China's national conditions with the goal of maintaining the level of food and clothing, with basic pension, medical care, unemployment, maternity, work injury and nursing insurance as the main contents, and diversified and optional supplementary insurance as the important auxiliary. Taking social insurance as the main body of the whole social security system is determined by the wide coverage of the social insurance system. Without this network as a barrier, the government's social assistance system will be overwhelmed. However, the basic social insurance system sets the level of protection at the level of maintaining adequate food and clothing, which is the basic requirement of the "remedial model" and also conforms to the financial affordability of the municipal government in China.
To supplement social welfare is to regard social welfare system as an indispensable part of a complete social security system, and strive to establish a social welfare system with China characteristics based on the social welfare of employees of state-owned enterprises, retired soldiers, all kinds of civil servants and courageous people, with occupational welfare, family welfare, public welfare and community welfare as the basic contents. Here, it is the unshirkable basic duty of the state to provide social welfare for employees of state-owned enterprises, retired soldiers, all kinds of public servants and courageous people. However, because the level of protection for these groups is generally higher than the general level of social insurance, most of them become one of the important means for the government and various social forces to compete for human resources, so they should be the basis of the social welfare system. At the same time, China should vigorously develop family welfare with government and social support as the main form, vigorously develop professional welfare provided by units aimed at improving social competitiveness, and vigorously develop social welfare undertakings and community welfare provided by the government, society and community residents. It should be noted that at present, the academic circles exaggerate the importance of community welfare, and some scholars even put forward the so-called concept of "community security" inappropriately, giving community security the status of "the second safety net" (Dou et al.: Exploration of reconstructing China's social security system, China Social Sciences Press, 200 1 Edition, p. 193). It should be pointed out that this idea may be established in theory, but the urban communities in China are far from mature enough to provide security for residents, and as long as community autonomy is empty talk, community service and community security will always be rootless and passive water, and sustainable development is impossible.
When designing the overall framework of the whole social security system, in addition to the basic objectives and security items, it should also include three systems:
(A) the legal system
It should be mainly composed of four parts: first, the social security legal system formulated by the National People's Congress is based on the social security law, with the social assistance law, social insurance law and social welfare law as the main contents, supplemented by some departmental laws; Second, the minimum living security, emergency assistance for victims, support for "three noes" and "five guarantees" personnel, social mutual assistance, poverty alleviation and development, medical care, education, housing, justice and other special assistance formulated by the State Council and provincial people's congresses, pension, medical care, unemployment, maternity, work-related injury and nursing insurance and their supplementary insurance, social welfare and professional welfare for employees of state-owned enterprises, retired soldiers, various civil servants and courageous people. Third, the implementation methods and specific standards of the above laws and regulations formulated by relevant ministries, local people's congresses and local governments in the State Council; Fourth, those systems, practices and measures that are still difficult to be upgraded to laws, regulations and rules are stipulated in the form of documents to form policies. Judging from the current actual situation, it is necessary to improve the social security laws and regulations system from two aspects: on the one hand, to formulate the social security law as soon as possible and determine the basic institutional framework; On the other hand, the mature practices in practice are fixed through policies, standards and rules, and then gradually improved to form a relatively complete social security laws and regulations system.
(2) Management system
According to years of practical experience and China's national conditions, the management system of social security system should be: unified leadership by the government, division of labor and cooperation by departments, extensive social participation, graded responsibility, graded capital contribution and graded management. Here are a few basic points:
First of all, it is not appropriate to set up a social security department with unified decision-making and unified operation within the government, or even to set up a unified leading group-style coordination body. As for the task of unified design and coordination, it should be entrusted to the social security legal system composed of social security law, social assistance law, social insurance law and social welfare law. There are three reasons to oppose the establishment of a unified social security department: First, from the actual situation, social security work involves too many fields, and related security work is closely related to the specific management activities in these fields in operation. Without professional knowledge in related fields, we can't do the identification, evidence collection, investigation and verification required by these security work well, and we can only get twice the result with half the effort. Second, starting from the principle of moderate administrative organization scope, handing over more than 30 social security projects to a government department will lead to too large management scope and too strong power of this department, which is not conducive to the orderly operation of the whole government organization. Third, judging from the existing experience, there is no precedent for any country in the world to concentrate all social security work, including social assistance, social insurance and social welfare, in one government department. Even in our country, there has never been a similar situation. The reason why we oppose the establishment of a unified coordinating body is because, from the actual situation, each leading group in our government agencies often sets up a special office, and the department where this office is located often becomes the actual decision-making department, which actually leads to the excessive concentration of many powers, and sometimes becomes the legal basis for this powerful department to interfere with other relevant departments at will, and even intensifies the friction and wrangling between departments.
Secondly, in the setting of social security institutions, we should adhere to the principle of division of labor and cooperation among departments. Specifically, in terms of social assistance, it is clear that the civil affairs department is the lead unit responsible for the overall control and specific coordination of the level of assistance. In addition to the minimum living security, emergency relief for victims, "three noes" and "five guarantees" support, and social mutual assistance, poverty alleviation and development should be handed over to the agricultural sector, medical assistance to the health sector, education aid to the education sector, housing assistance to the construction sector, and judicial assistance to the judicial sector. In terms of social insurance, it is clear that the labor and social security departments are the leading and coordinating units. Except for the old-age insurance, unemployment insurance, industrial injury insurance and its supplementary insurance, which continue to be decided and operated by the labor and social security department, all work closely related to health management, such as medical insurance, maternity insurance, nursing insurance and its supplementary insurance, should be handed over to the health department for operation. In terms of social welfare, a coordinating body should be set up to take overall responsibility, and the occupational welfare of employees in state-owned enterprises and various enterprises should be handed over to the labor and social security departments for operation; the social welfare, family welfare, public welfare, community welfare and occupational welfare of retired soldiers, courageous people and various special social groups including the elderly should be handed over to the civil affairs departments, and the social welfare of employees in various public servants, institutions and institutions should be handed over to personnel. This division of labor, on the one hand, considers which department the related work is most related to in specific operations, on the other hand, considers the traditional division of labor of related businesses.
Third, from the perspective of the division of responsibilities, we should correctly distinguish the responsibilities of the state, society, family and individual. Undoubtedly, the government should be fully responsible for the social assistance system and social welfare of all ex-servicemen and civil servants, from capital contribution to organization and implementation, although the security work in these fields does not exclude or even advocate the active participation of society, which is determined by the functions of the state. In terms of social insurance, the government's responsibility is mainly responsible for the organization and capital contribution, including the establishment of rules and regulations, the organization and implementation, and the ultimate responsibility for the funds needed for basic social insurance. Both society and individuals have the obligation to pay social insurance premiums in accordance with regulations. Of course, social participation in specific service work is not excluded here. In terms of social welfare, the main responsibility of the state is to establish laws and regulations, guide investment, support policies and supervise management, and social forces are the main force to realize the social welfare system.
Fourth, in the process of establishing the social security management system, we must adhere to the principles of graded responsibility, graded capital contribution and graded management. This is determined by the division of labor between the central and local governments in China's administrative management system, the two lines of revenue and expenditure, the fiscal and taxation management system of graded responsibility and the characteristics of social security work itself, which is in line with the specific national conditions of China's vast territory, uneven economic and social development level and great differences in historical and cultural customs.
(3) service system
Based on the current exploration ideas and the established social assistance, social insurance and social welfare service institutions and their operation, this paper holds that the basic pattern of the social security service system should be a social security service network with state-owned social security service institutions as the model, other social security service institutions with various forms of ownership as the backbone, community service as the support and family service as the foundation. Taking the social security service institutions organized by the state as an example, the social assistance service institutions, social insurance service institutions and social welfare service institutions organized and managed by the state play an exemplary and normative role in terms of service level, business norms, hardware and team building. Social security service institutions with various forms of ownership are the backbone, that is, social security service institutions with various forms of ownership are the main bodies providing social security services. The state provides services to social security objects by purchasing services from them, and encourages them to provide free and low-cost services to social security objects through policy support. Relying on community service is to build a number of social security service facilities and outlets in the community, set up a number of intermediary service organizations, set up a full-time and part-time service team, widely mobilize community units to participate in social security services, and form a social security service network. Based on family service, it is necessary to adhere to the basic position of family in social security service, and give full play to the function and role of family in social security service through moral education, public opinion propaganda, system norms and policy support. It is particularly emphasized here that in the process of building the social security service network, the informatization construction must be placed in a prominent and important position, because realizing the informatization of social security services can greatly improve the efficiency of social security services, greatly save manpower, material resources and financial resources, and is conducive to the implementation of services to families and individuals.
Third, path selection and policy recommendations
In view of the above problems and tasks, in order to establish and improve China's social security system, we must choose the basic path of building the overall framework with the construction of laws and regulations, and explore and practice the improvement of various systems. Generally, there are three steps: system integration, exploration and practice, and improvement of laws and regulations.
The so-called system integration means that within three to five years, the overall framework of the social security system will be formed by formulating and promulgating the basic laws of the social security system, such as the social security law, the social assistance law, the social insurance law, and the social welfare law, based on the principle of "remedial mode". The core task of system integration is to construct the project framework of social security system, establish social assistance system with the goal of ensuring living standard, social insurance system with the goal of ensuring food and clothing level and social welfare system with the goal of improving security level. Through system integration, it is necessary to clarify the basic structure of China's social security system, the basic contents, security levels and relationships of social assistance, social insurance and social welfare, and the division of responsibilities, duties and obligations of the government, society, families and individuals, especially governments at all levels, in various social security projects. During this period, many micro or even meso issues need to be clarified, but after nearly ten years of exploration and practice, the macro framework issues, objectives, methods and responsibilities have been basically clarified, and it should be said that the necessary conditions for legislation have been met. Of course, the legal provisions of the establishment period cannot be very accurate, and there must be many loopholes. The requirements of many clauses will definitely lose their principles and generality, but such laws and regulations are better than none, especially in the case of serious defects in the current social security system construction. Therefore, it has become an urgent task to establish and clarify the overall framework of China's social security system through legislation.
The so-called exploration and practice, is to use 5 to 10 years, within the principles and framework of basic laws and regulations such as social security law, combined with the achievements of real social security system construction, to boldly explore, with a view to forming more mature ideas and operational norms for various social security systems at the micro, meso and even macro levels. The main tasks of this period are: first, structural adjustment and compensation of the existing social security system. It is necessary to straighten out the relationship between social assistance, social insurance and social welfare system as soon as possible, vigorously strengthen the construction of social assistance system, actively and steadily reduce the level of social insurance protection, and establish rural minimum living security system, nursing insurance system, supplementary social insurance and family welfare system. The second is to grasp the key and core social security projects and form a relatively perfect system. Focus on improving the minimum living security system, pay more attention to old-age insurance, unemployment insurance and medical insurance, and pay special attention to the social welfare system and community welfare system for veterans. The third is to explore other social security projects one by one and form a series of relatively complete system norms. For example, emergency relief for victims, support for "three noes" and "five guarantees" personnel, social mutual assistance, medical assistance for poverty alleviation, education aid, housing assistance, judicial assistance, various supplementary social insurance, social welfare for employees of state-owned enterprises, various public servants, courageous people and various special social groups including the elderly, the disabled and children, as well as various occupational welfare, family welfare and public welfare undertakings.
The so-called perfection of laws and regulations means that on the basis of previous exploration and practice, it will take another three to five years to revise the basic social security laws formed before, and comprehensively sort out, revise and clean up various laws, regulations, standards, norms and policies gradually formed during the exploration and practice, so as to lay a legal foundation for the formation of a unified, complete and standardized social security system.
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