Social Security Fund budget revealed amid deficit concerns

The Chinese government released its budget for the Social Security Fund (SSF) for 2013, underlining the country's efforts to boost transparency in the midst of escalating public worries over the pension deficit.

The budget, released by the Ministry of Finance on Tuesday, was for the first time included in this year's national budget report, which had been submitted to an annual session of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, for review in March.

China's social security fund includes five parts: basic endowment insurance, basic medical insurance, unemployment insurance, work-related injury insurance and maternity insurance.

The way the fund is used has drawn increasing public attention in recent years, with some proposing a postponement of the retirement age to relieve pressure on the fund.

According to the plan, the budgetary income for the country's social security fund will total 3.28 trillion yuan (520 billion U.S.dollars) this year, up 9.9 percent from last year, which will bring the outstanding account to 4.09 trillion yuan at the end of 2013.

The endowment insurance fund for urban and rural residents will grow 9.4 percent year on year to 209.8 billion yuan, with an outstanding account of 302.6 billion yuan by the end of 2013.

Medical insurance for urban and rural residents is expected to climb 17 percent over the previous year to reach 376.3 billion yuan.

Although the data for the endowment insurance fund's outstanding account is reassuring, some experts have warned that it is not enough to gauge the true state of the country's pension deficit.

The country's pension gap at the height of an aging society will be very large, said Dai Xianglong, former head of China's National Council for SSF.

While attending the Bo'ao Forum in April, Minister of Finance Lou Jiwei said there are many loopholes in the social security fund system that are waiting to be fixed.

"Without fixing these loopholes with more constraints and providing more incentives for growth, any amount of government subsidies for the social security fund will be squandered," Lou said.