What is the impact of universal two-child policy on social insurance? The "Recommendations of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Formulating the Thirteenth Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development" clearly states that the policy of allowing a couple to have two children will be fully implemented, which has attracted great attention from the society.

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The implementation of this policy will have a profound impact on my country's population structure.

Recently, Dong Zhaohui, deputy director of the Medical Insurance Research Office of the Social Security Research Institute of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, who is responsible for the impact of the "universal two-child" policy on social insurance, pointed out in an interview with reporters that understanding the short-term and long-term, positive and negative effects of this policy,

It is very necessary to guide the future work of social insurance.

The "universal two-child" policy will not put great pressure on maternity insurance funds. Question: The "Recommendations of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Formulating the Thirteenth Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development" clearly states that a couple can have two children after full implementation.

child policy.

Regarding social insurance, after the implementation of the policy, maternity insurance is currently most affected.

Based on the operation of my country's maternity insurance in recent years, could you please talk about the impact of fully liberalizing the second child on fund expenditures?

Dong Zhaohui: In recent years, my country's birth rate has continued to decline. The number of women of childbearing age has dropped from 349 million in 2000 to 309 million in 2013. The proportion of the population has dropped from 27.59% to 22.70%. The number of babies born has dropped from 2000 to 2000. The number dropped from 17.77 million in 2013 to 16.4 million in 2013.

It can be seen that if the family planning policy is not adjusted, the number of babies born will further decline.

After the implementation of the “universal two-child” policy, the expenditure on maternity insurance funds will first increase.

In the past few years, my country's maternity insurance fund balance has been relatively large, and it can basically withstand the increase in expenditures brought about by the "universal two-child" policy.

At the end of 2014, the cumulative balance of the national maternity insurance fund was enough to cover 20 months of benefits on average. Although the annual balance rate of maternity insurance funds has been declining in recent years, the fund balance rate in 2014 still reached 17.5%.

Overall, the “comprehensive two-child” policy will not put great pressure on maternity insurance funds.

Question: If the childbirth policy is not adjusted, what will happen to the income and expenditure of the social security fund? Dong Zhaohui: The aging of the population poses a long-term threat to the social security fund, and the childbirth policy will not have an immediate impact on the population structure.

In the next 10 years, the balance of payments of employee pension insurance and employee medical insurance funds will encounter difficulties.

Especially in the next 20 years, this problem will become more serious.

Therefore, social security departments should do a good job in fund early warning, and governments at all levels should attach great importance to the smooth operation of funds and adopt various measures to ensure the payment of social security benefits and maintain social stability.

If the “universal two-child” policy can be implemented well, the positive impact of this policy on funds will appear in 20 years.

Be wary of the risk of "adverse selection" in maternity insurance among insured people. Question: In 2013, my country began to implement the new policy of "two children alone". What has been the change in my country's maternity insurance fund expenditure since the implementation of the new policy?

Dong Zhaohui: After the implementation of the "two-child policy" in 2013, comparing the data of 2014 with the data of 2012, although the number of babies born nationwide only increased by 3%, the number of births among people covered by maternity insurance increased by 30.5%.

, while the number of people covered by maternity insurance only increased by 10.4% during the same period.

This shows that people covered by maternity insurance have a stronger desire to have children, or that people with a stronger desire to have children will actively participate in maternity insurance.

Under this circumstance, the balance rate of the maternity insurance fund dropped significantly, from 27.9% in 2012 to 17.5% in 2014.

Therefore, maternity insurance itself must control the risk of “adverse selection”.

Of course, if maternity insurance is used as a measure to encourage childbirth, then the government should increase investment in maternity insurance. Fortunately, the scale of the maternity insurance fund is not large, accounting for only 1.1% of the total social security fund, and will not cause too much financial impact.

Big burden.

For maternity insurance, the risk of “adverse selection” among insured persons is worth noting.

Since maternity insurance is not compulsory for all, people who want to have children may choose to participate in the insurance, while people who do not want to have children do not participate in the insurance. This will lead to a substantial increase in the expenditure of the maternity insurance fund, but the increase in fund income will be limited.

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For example, in 2014, the population covered by national maternity insurance increased by only 3.9%, while the number of births increased by 19.2%.

After the implementation of the “universal two-child” policy, the risk of “adverse selection” will become more prominent.

Q: What measures do you think the local social security department should take to effectively avoid "adverse selection" in maternity insurance?

Dong Zhaohui: Strengthening insurance participation in accordance with the law and ensuring that everyone is covered is the main measure to control the risk of “adverse selection”.

At present, maternity insurance in my country mainly covers employees. Insurance supervision should be strengthened and all employees should be required to participate in maternity insurance.

If the number of employees participating in basic medical insurance is used as the number of people who should be insured for maternity insurance, then the insurance participation rate in 2014 was about 81%. Therefore, there is still room to increase the insurance participation rate.

It is expected that the "universal two-child policy" will curb the decline of the institutional dependency ratio in 2035. Q: The comprehensive liberalization of two children is a major measure to actively respond to the aging of the population.

For basic pension insurance, the direct benefit is to improve the system dependency ratio.