Vietnam is making every effort to enhance the quality of people’s life and welfare. Over the past 30 years of đổi mới, or renovation, process, the social protection system has been improved gradually. There exist, however, many challenges and inadequacies in the social protection system. The household-based access to social protection and gender mainstreaming remain limited, especially in the areas of vocational training and elderly care. Those who have participated in social insurance to receive retirement pensions in the future just make a low proportion. The quality of the healthcare services covered by the health insurances is not good enough. People still consider social protection to be a type of subsidy from the Government, which is not enthusiastic about issuing social protection policies. This paper focuses on the current status of social protection policies and suggests several possible policy responses, aiming at improving social protection for the Vietnamese families.