The Impact Of Social Insurance On The Subjective Welfare Of Residents

Solving the problem of unbalanced and insufficient social development and satisfying people’s growing demand for a better life are important tasks in the current development process.Subjective welfare,as an important indicator of residents’ quality of life,reflects the degree of material and spiritual two-way satisfaction of residents,and can also be affected by a variety of factors,among which social insurance,as part of social security,minimizes the risks and uncertainties that residents may face in their daily lives,greatly enhancing their sense of security and thus influencing the level of individual subjective welfare.It remains to be tested,then,whether social insurance can improve the welfare level of individuals.An accurate assessment of the impact of social insurance on residents’ subjective well-being will enable the implementation of targeted policies to meet people’s needs and promote the implementation of the Health China strategy.Therefore,based on relevant theoretical foundations,this paper uses data from the China Labor Force Survey(CLDS)2016 and 2018 to explore the impact of social insurance on the subjective welfare of Chinese residents using a fixed-effects model controlling for time and region.First,this paper comprehensively examines the impact of social insurance on residents’ subjective well-being,including three dimensions of subjective well-being,life satisfaction,and depression level.This paper not only focuses on the impact of individual social insurance participation status,but also analyzes in depth the impact of the type of social insurance participation and the type of participation on individual subjective well-being,thus assessing the impact of social insurance on residents’ subjective well-being comprehensively at both the breadth and depth levels.Second,based on individual differences,we also examine the heterogeneity of social insurance impact on individual subjective welfare from the perspective of education level and income.Finally,the mechanisms and channels through which social insurance affects residents’ subjective welfare are further revealed.The relevant findings show that participation in social insurance does increase residents’ subjective well-being and life satisfaction,reduces their depression level,and thus increases their subjective welfare,and this boost increases with the type of participation in social insurance.The results of distinguishing different types of social insurance found that the promotion effect of basic medical insurance,basic pension insurance and work injury insurance on individual subjective welfare was more obvious.Heterogeneity analysis shows that the positive effect of social insurance is more pronounced among residents with middle education level and residents with high income.Finally,the mechanism analysis finds that social insurance improves residents’ subjective welfare by increasing their social trust.Based on the above empirical results,this paper gives relevant countermeasure suggestions: first,to increase publicity efforts to make more residents understand and agree with social insurance and enhance the coverage of social insurance;second,to improve the comprehensiveness of social insurance,including improving the degree of protection of basic medical insurance,basic pension insurance,work injury insurance,maternity insurance and unemployment insurance to further enhance residents’ risk resistance;third,to target low education level and low-income groups,and increase the policy tilt to ensure that residents’ basic needs are protected;fourth,policy makers should improve efficiency and service quality,establish a social trust mechanism,and play the mediating role of social trust in social insurance to enhance residents’ subjective welfare.