In the past three decades, Xiamen has carried forward the daring spirit of the SEZ, courageous enough to break old rules and conventions. Xiamen was the first city to reform state-owned enterprises (SOEs), the first to call off administrative management departments, the first to introduce the income tax instead of turning profit over to the state and the separation of administrative functions from enterprise management, the first to open its market and cancel planned supply, the first to open up the production material market, the property market, labor market and technology market, the first to build an airport with overseas investment, and the first to set up a Sino-foreign joint venture bank. It has worked out a reform path featuring comprehensive advancements, major breakthroughs and integrated development. It has played a leading role in China's reform and opening-up endeavor, and made faster progress in building a socialist market economic system than many other regions.

System reform and economic restructuring

Xiamen has strived to construct a modern market system, taking the initiative to open the market and regulate the market order. It has actively promoted various types of rural household contract responsibility systems, combined centralized and decentralized operations, boosted rural economic development and accomplished transformation from a traditional agriculture to a modern agriculture. In urban areas, it has carried out economic structure reform in an orderly fashion. While continuing to open up, Xiamen has been actively bringing in foreign investment and readjusting and upgrading the ownership structure. The state-owned economy has gained greater vigor and vitality through various types of ownership reforms. Meanwhile, the SEZ has also witnessed joint development of foreign-funded, stake-holding, private and personal-owned enterprises. A new pattern of market economy has been formed, featuring the harmonious coexistence of various types of ownership economies. In 2010, private and personal-owned enterprises absorbed the largest number of employees, accounting for 48.7 percent of the total. Xiamen has deepened investment system reform, encouraged multi-facetted investment bodies and methods, boosted the development of land, technology, capital and human resources markets, greatly promoted the social and public undertakings reform in the fields of science and technology, education, culture, public health and sports. The reform of the city's administrative management system has been deepened with transformed government functions. Xiamen has also reformed its administrative system, price management system, investment and financing system, fiscal system, foreign trade system, land management system, urban construction management system and social undertaking management system. The basic framework of a socialist market economic system has been formed.

Improved social security

Xiamen SEZ is the first to set up a housing provident fund system, creating a public and personal account for each payer. It has also promoted insurance including pensions, unemployment benefits, work injury compensation, medicare and birth insurance. It was the first SEZ to promote a minimum wage, urban and rural minimum living allowances, social security system, rural cooperative medical care system, pensions for farmers whose land is reclaimed by the government, and a serious illness relief system. Xiamen is also the first to bring migrant workers under insurance coverage and the first to cancel the employment certificate of migrant workers and the home stay fee for their children.

Xiamen Urban and Rural Residents Pension Interim Provisions, enacted in 2010, covers all residents of Xiamen. The city is the first to establish an integrated urban and rural resident basic medicare insurance system which covers common and frequently occurring diseases, giving rural and urban residents equal rights in medical insurance. Xiamen provides a supplementary medical insurance, covering rural and urban residents, juveniles and college students. By the end of 2010, the number of people participating in basic pension, basic medical insurance, unemployment insurance and work injury insurance had reached 1.5861 million, 2.3487 million, 1.256 million and 1.218 million respectively.

In 2005, Xiamen adopted a multi-level housing security system covering all urban residents, by providing poor urban residents with low-rent housing, social security-oriented rental housing and affordable homes. It is reputed as a "Xiamen-style" housing security system. The city has planed to build 20 social security housing projects, covering 1.55 million square meters with total floor space reaching 4.25 million square meters. It has provided 45,000 affordable social housing units with investment totaling 13.3 billion yuan ($2.03 billion). By the end of 2010, Xiamen had handled 23,136 applications for affordable housing, among which 20,658 families filed for low-rent apartments, while 3,478 were up for affordable homes.