Round Table Meeting

Recently, Wang Xiaoping, Secretary of the Party Group and Minister of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, published an article titled "Solidly Promoting the Construction of Social Security System with Chinese Characteristics" in the "Qiushi" magazine. The article points out that "enhancing the accessibility of social security and actively promoting high-quality insurance participation." Accessibility refers to bringing more people into the coverage of the social security system. In recent years, human resources and social security departments in various regions have continuously strengthened the work of expanding the coverage of insurance. In response to the problems of "missing insurance", "leaving insurance", and "cutting insurance", big data and other information technologies have been used to accurately target the uninsured population. At the same time, for key groups such as new industry practitioners, flexible employment personnel, and migrant workers, insurance measures have been improved, insurance publicity has been strengthened, and efforts have been made to promote full participation and full coverage, achieving high-quality insurance. What is the current situation of promoting the expansion of insurance coverage in various regions? What are the highlights of the work that have emerged? How will we further promote the expansion of insurance coverage and enhance the accessibility of social security in the future? The reporter interviewed relevant officials and experts from the human resources and social security department.

Expanding the scope and improving the quality of social security, happiness is within reach

Host: Yang Qin, reporter from China Labor Security News

guest:

Zhu Hua, Director of Jiangsu Provincial Social Insurance Fund Management Center

Yang Shangbin, Secretary of the Party Committee and Director of Chongqing Social Insurance Bureau

Xue Huiyuan, Deputy Director and Associate Professor of the Social Security Research Center at Wuhan University

Establishing regulations and implementing classified policies to promote the expansion of insurance coverage

Reporter: What measures have been taken in your area to include more people in the coverage of social security? How to increase the participation rate of key groups such as new business practitioners, flexible employees, and migrant workers?

Zhu Hua: In recent years, various regions in Jiangsu have closely focused on the requirement of universal social security coverage, using the implementation of the universal insurance plan as a starting point to promote the transformation of social insurance from full coverage of the system to full coverage of the population. Strengthen high-level promotion, include expansion work in the assessment, and form a clear guidance to encourage all regions to vigorously promote expansion. Establish a provincial-level centralized national insurance registration database to basically understand the expansion base. Develop a social security operation monitoring platform and deepen the implementation of nationwide social insurance registration work. Carry out activities such as "Social Security Promotion Around Us" and "Social Security Services for Every Household", produce the "Su Xiaobao · Talking about Social Security" series of promotional videos, and create a good working atmosphere for all people to participate in social security. Establish a unified online service hall throughout the province, actively implement the "one matter, one handling" policy, and integrate employment, and social security registration for enterprise insurance registration, making social security handling services more convenient and efficient.

For key groups such as employees in new business formats, flexible workers, and migrant workers, we will adhere to classified policies and guide them to actively participate in insurance and pay premiums. Carry out pilot work on occupational injury protection for new forms of employment. Cancel the registered residence registration restrictions for flexible employees to participate in insurance, make good use of the social insurance subsidy policy, and launch the social insurance service area for flexible employees on the online platform to facilitate flexible employees to apply for insurance participation and suspension. Starting from strengthening the insurance coverage of construction projects where migrant workers gather, we will implement dynamic real name management of insurance information for project employees, and safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of construction project workers.

Yang Shangbin: Chongqing has taken multiple measures to promote the expansion of insurance coverage. Establish and improve a work linkage mechanism led by the Municipal Human Resources and Social Security Bureau and closely coordinated by relevant municipal departments. Regularly monitor the progress of task completion in each district and county, and incorporate precise expansion work into the district and county assessment. Launch the insurance coverage expansion module in the digital social security "cockpit" and schedule the progress of the city's coverage expansion work. Establish a data comparison mechanism between "departments+insurance types", screen the information of people who should participate but not participate, establish an accurate expansion data resource database, distribute the accurate expansion module to the districts and counties, and the districts and counties will carry out the expansion work through regular comparison with the registered residence and other data of the public security. Strengthen data sharing with departments such as civil affairs, agriculture, and rural areas, regularly compare the insurance coverage of disadvantaged groups, retired fishermen, land acquisition and resettlement personnel, and interrupted payment personnel, and promote the insurance coverage of key groups. Provide proactive reminder services for insurance coverage, create a "direct insurance coverage" service area on the "Chongqing Human Resources and Social Security" app, and launch residents' pension insurance coverage, suspension, and renewal online on the "Chongqing Kuaiban" and "Chongqing Human Resources and Social Security" mobile apps. Participate in 61 high-frequency social security services such as employee pension insurance coverage, suspension, and renewal as an individual, and improve the intelligence of online and mobile insurance coverage. Focus on the most concerned insurance policies of the masses, produce various forms of tweets and videos, and help the masses to participate in insurance with peace of mind. We will closely follow up on offline activities and widely carry out on-site activities such as "Social Security Services for Every Household" and "Three Entries and Three Deliveries" to enhance the awareness of social security among the whole population.

Obtain relevant data and compare it with key groups such as employees in new business formats, flexible employment personnel, and migrant workers, and distribute data on those who have not participated in basic pension insurance to districts and counties to carry out expansion mobilization. Strengthen collaboration with the construction project management department, obtain data on the commencement of construction projects in the city, issue data on projects that have not participated in work-related injury insurance to districts and counties, conduct verification of insurance coverage, and effectively protect the rights and interests of migrant workers in construction projects.

Xue Huiyuan: For new industry practitioners, flexible employment personnel, migrant workers and other groups, taking pension insurance as an example, current policies can be improved from two aspects: "expanding coverage" and "improving quality".

At present, non employee groups participating in the basic pension insurance for enterprise employees as flexible employees can choose an appropriate payment base between 60% and 300% of the average salary of urban employees in the province, with a payment ratio of 20%. For flexible employees, the burden of payment is heavy. It is suggested that the registered residence registration limit for this group to participate in social insurance in the place of employment should be fully liberalized, the payment base and proportion should be appropriately reduced, and social insurance subsidies for flexible employees should be increased to encourage more people to participate in insurance. For those who have difficulty in paying fees, we can strengthen the basic old-age insurance for urban and rural residents, increase the payment of old-age insurance premiums and financial subsidies, and gradually loosen the registered residence registration restrictions for flexible employment personnel to participate in residents' old-age insurance in the place of employment. At the same time, it is necessary to improve the transfer and continuation methods of employee and resident pension insurance. When transferring between resident pension insurance and employee pension insurance, efforts should be made to minimize welfare losses, simplify procedures, and improve the convenience and ease of transferring and continuing pension insurance relationships.

The low payment base and short payment period of flexible employment personnel and migrant workers have led to insufficient accumulation of pension insurance and a lower future pension level. In order to improve the quality of insurance participation, it is necessary to strengthen the incentive mechanism of "more contributions, more rewards" for employee pension insurance and resident pension insurance in the two links of payment and benefit collection. The amount of financial subsidies between different payment levels should be appropriately opened up, and the personal account interest rate of long-term payment personnel should be increased. The basic pension should adopt a tiered calculation method, and the proportion of pension adjustments linked to the payment years should be increased.

Cleverly utilizing precise data services to enhance the continuity of insurance coverage

Reporter: How do you think effective solutions should be taken to address the issues of "missing insurance", "leaving insurance", and "cutting off insurance" for some groups?

Zhu Hua: Make full use of the advantages of big data, strengthen data sharing and comparison with tax, medical insurance, market supervision and other departments, strengthen data comparison with occupational injury protection, flexible employment personnel at the end of last year, accurately identify uninsured units, Units with incomplete insurance coverage and uninsured individuals, establish a province wide social insurance expansion resource library, and build a working mechanism of "provincial-level task and data issuance, city and county verification and promotion". Timely send reminder messages to uninsured units, units with incomplete coverage, and uninsured individuals to urge and guide them to participate in insurance. Promptly send reminder letters to units that are still not insured or have not fully enrolled in insurance to urge them to participate. For those who have interrupted payment, accurate promotion will be carried out through Alipay, WeChat applet and other channels to promote their early renewal and long-term payment. Encourage various regions to adopt financial subsidies to promote insurance assistance policies for disadvantaged groups, and try to promote the "interest subsidy renewal" policy that benefits the people, in order to help more "insured" and disadvantaged individuals "renew their insurance".

Yang Shangbin: Deepen the coordination of employment and social security, share employment data in real time, ensure that one person who is employed is covered by insurance, and one person who is cut off from insurance is assisted in finding employment. Strengthen the collaboration and sharing among various types of social security insurance, enhance the information comparison with insured personnel of new forms of occupational injury protection, and implement precise expansion. Dynamically monitor the situation of urban enterprise employees who have had their pension insurance terminated, regularly screen information on older employees who have interrupted payment, provide accurate policy recommendations, and guide them to renew their insurance as soon as possible. Carry out the "Chongqing Insurance Loan" initiative to benefit the people, assist insured individuals who have participated in the basic pension insurance for enterprise employees but temporarily face payment difficulties in continuing to pay, fully leverage the positive role of pension finance in promoting high-quality and sustainable development of social security, and effectively alleviate the payment pressure of flexible employment personnel. We will focus on creating a multidimensional publicity matrix that combines online and offline promotion, traditional and innovative promotion, and continuously expand the radiation circle of social security publicity. Launch intelligent and convenient applications, accurately promote and push social security and insurance policies, effectively strengthen the promotion of "pay more, get more,Contribute for a longer period, receive more benefits.", and guide insured persons to pay more and pay longer .

Xue Huiyuan: Some groups have unstable income sources and do not attach importance to social insurance, resulting in situations of "missing insurance", "leaving insurance", and "insurance interruption" from time to time. For low-income groups who cannot afford to pay, they can be encouraged to transfer from employee pension insurance to resident pension insurance and transfer all personal account funds to reduce the situation of "insurance interruption". In addition, according to current pension insurance regulations, both employee pension insurance and resident pension insurance generally do not allow flexible employees to make up for the pension insurance premiums during the previous "insurance suspension" period. However, flexible employment personnel and other groups may have unstable jobs and fluctuating income, which may result in a period of inability to cover expenses. For this purpose, flexible employees can be allowed to make up for their pension insurance premiums in a targeted and conditional manner, ensuring the continuity of their pension insurance contributions.

For those who are "missed," "withdrawn," or "terminated" due to not valuing or understanding social insurance programs, it is necessary to optimize handling services and strengthen policy promotion. On the one hand, it is possible to simplify the procedures for participating in insurance, by extending consultation services related to insurance registration, payment, and relationship transfer to the community, or by setting up specialized service windows for flexible employment personnel in pension insurance agencies. On the other hand, government departments at all levels, community neighborhood committees, and village committees should increase the publicity of social insurance, improve the level of informatization, and increase the awareness and attention of the official website of the human resources and social security department, the 12333 service hotline, and the Smart Human Resources and Social Security App.

Promote experience innovation models and expand pilot programs for occupational injury protection

Reporter: What is the progress of the pilot work on occupational injury protection for new forms of employment? What are the plans or suggestions for policy optimization and expanding pilot programs?

Zhu Hua: Starting from July 2022, the human resources and social security departments of Jiangsu Province have strictly implemented the requirements of national and provincial deployment, and promoted the pilot work of occupational injury protection for new forms of employment with high quality, achieving phased results and effectively safeguarding the legitimate rights and interests of platform enterprise employees, promoting the healthy development of the platform economy.

Next, Jiangsu will innovate the entrusted mode of social business cooperation, summarize experience and practices, improve the institutional system, do a good job in policy continuity, and timely expand the coverage of guarantees. Carry out occupational injury prevention, promote platform enterprises and new forms of employment to enhance prevention awareness, improve prevention capabilities, and resolve occupational injuries. Develop and construct the second phase of the occupational injury protection information system to achieve "one click circulation, one network operation, and integrated improvement" of occupational injury protection and work-related injury insurance business internally; To achieve smooth data business interaction with the department platform, provincial taxation, 400 service hotline, and commissioned agencies, optimize and enhance the efficiency of occupational injury protection handling services.

Yang Shangbin: Chongqing continues to implement a work mechanism of risk sharing and joint efforts with commercial insurance institutions, adopting a service mode of regional service and unified assessment throughout the city, continuously consolidating the "three closed loops" of full process closed-loop management, all-round closed-loop service, and full process closed-loop assessment, fully stimulating the vitality of all parties, and jointly promoting the pilot work of occupational injury protection. Chongqing has clarified the work principles, reform objectives, main reform measures, progress arrangements, and safeguard measures, and actively promoted the reform of occupational injury protection to "start early, promote quickly, and achieve practical results".

Next, Chongqing will explore the establishment of a new model for occupational injury protection based on the actual reform work, gradually include all platforms of new employment forms in the scope of insurance coverage, and establish a new occupational injury protection system for new employment forms. At the same time, we will improve the mechanism for entrusting the handling of occupational injury protection, create a new model of occupational injury protection where the government takes the lead and commercial insurance plays a role, and create a comprehensive and all-round management service system to achieve multi cross collaboration and full protection.

Xue Huiyuan: Currently, the pilot work on occupational injury protection for new forms of employment has achieved certain results, but further improvement is still needed. On the one hand, the pilot policy for occupational injury protection for new forms of employment does not provide clear regulations on the scope and threshold of insurance coverage, occupational injury identification standards, industry payment rates, and the division of payment responsibilities among multiple platforms, especially in some pilot schemes in certain regions where the responsibility of the platform is not emphasized. Based on the characteristics of the new industry format, the future can promote the model of "single payment, platform and individual burden" to achieve full coverage of occupational injury protection. On the other hand, local governments can explore suitable occupational injury protection schemes for new forms of employment in the local area based on the actual situation such as the number of local employees, the scale of platform enterprises, the financial status of work-related injury insurance funds, and the development of commercial insurance, under the guidance of the national pilot program, and further expand the scope of the pilot program. For regions that currently do not have the conditions for pilot programs, the human resources and social security department can encourage platform enterprises to cooperate with commercial insurance companies to provide commercial personal accident insurance for employees, and adopt a "commercial insurance path" to cope with the occupational injury risks of employees in new business formats.

Source: China Labor Security News, 3rd edition, June 7, 2024.