When Money Runs Out: The Safety Net, Medical Bills and Cutting Living Costs

This is the last-resort checklist. Most of these programmes are free to apply for; the hard part is knowing they exist.

Government help

Temporary assistance

If a sudden event such as a fire, accident or a family member's serious illness overwhelms basic living, apply at the township government or street office. You do not need to be a subsistence-allowance household. It is usually a one-off payment, and amounts vary widely by place.

Subsistence allowance (dibao)

If household income divided by members is below the local line and your assets meet the rules, apply in your registered locality. At the end of 2024 the national average line was 798.1 yuan per person per month in cities and 593.9 yuan in rural areas. The payment is the line minus actual per-person income. Owning a home, car or savings above the local limit, or having children able to support you, may disqualify you. Once approved you also get help paying resident medical insurance, medical assistance, and legal aid without a hardship check.

Shelters

Rescue shelters provide food and lodging, send the sick to hospital, help contact family, and give transport tickets home if you have no money, generally for up to about 10 days. It is voluntary, not detention, and no cash is given. Tickets are issued for your registered or residence location, so decide where you are going before you ask.

Medical bills

Keep resident medical insurance paid (about 400 yuan a year)

Individuals pay from about 400 yuan and the government subsidises roughly 700 yuan per person. Households in extreme hardship can have the premium fully paid and subsistence-allowance households partly paid. A gap has a price: if you did not enrol in the enrolment period or did not pay continuously, there is a 3-month waiting period after you pay, with an extra month for each additional year of gap.

For a serious illness, follow this order

Register for cross-province treatment in the National Healthcare Security app before admission so you can settle at discharge without paying the whole bill upfront. After basic insurance and major-illness insurance, apply for medical assistance at your township or street office for what you still cannot pay. Employees get a medical period of 3 to 24 months based on years worked, during which the employer cannot dismiss them. Do not use online loans or private high-interest borrowing: courts only protect interest up to four times the one-year LPR, but the principal must still be repaid. Call 120 in an emergency; hospitals may not refuse treatment, and emergency costs are covered first by a disease emergency relief fund.

Add a one-year medical policy, and look for "guaranteed renewal"

Such a policy covers the part basic insurance doesn't pay, plus lost income. Policies without the words "guaranteed renewal" may be discontinued or repriced next year. Disclose your health honestly, or claims can be refused; after two years from the start of the contract the insurer can no longer cancel it for non-disclosure. Don't stack two reimbursement-style policies, since the same expense can't be claimed twice. Pay for basic insurance first.

Cut the two biggest costs first

In 2025, food was 29.3% of average national household consumption and housing 21.7%, together more than half, so trimming them has the biggest effect. In the author's experience, converting a daily-rate room or hourly hotel to a month costs more than a shared flat, and cooking at home is cheaper than takeaway. When job hunting, ask whether food and lodging are included: such a job removes both items.

Build a plan with our budgeting guide and emergency fund guide.

Source and license: adapted from HowToLiveBetter (高性价比人生指南) by eternity4719, Section 5 "Don't Waste Money", licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://github.com/eternity4719/HowToLiveBetter). We condensed and translated the original entries; see the source for evidence grades and citations. Rules described here apply to mainland China and may change. This is educational content, not investment, tax or insurance advice.