Asian Welfare States

1. As Asian nations continue to grow, national policy has moved towards providing modern social safety nets.

2. China recently extended pension coverage to an additional 240 million rural people.

3. This is far more than the total number of people covered by Social Security, the U.S. public-pension system.

4. A few years ago, about 80% of people in rural China had no health insurance. Now virtually everyone does.

5. Even more surprising, Indonesia’s government has promised to provide all 240 million of its citizens with health insurance by 2014.

6. Indonesia is effectively building the biggest “single-payer” national health scheme in the world.

From Asia’s next revolution (The Economist)