The divisions have become a source of discontent, and sometimes protests — when, for example, children from the countryside or from another city cannot enroll in a local school or take the university entrance exam where they live.

Mr. Xi and, particularly, Prime Minister Li Keqiang have argued that faster urbanization should become an engine of economic growth in the coming decades. Already, 174 million of China’s 1.3 billion people are rural migrants working away from their hometowns, Yang Zhiming, a labor and social welfare official, said at the news conference. Many economists say the barriers deter consumption by migrant workers, who are afraid to spend more of their savings.

At a meeting on Wednesday of the State Council Standing Committee — China’s equivalent of a government cabinet — Mr. Li said rural migrants with steady jobs in cities “must steadily become absorbed into cities as new urbanites, enjoying the same basic public services and equal rights,” Xinhua, the state news agency, reported.

“They must not be regarded as urban second-class citizens,” he said.

The government document released on Wednesday brought together commitments, some already announced, to steadily and selectively lift some of these barriers. Some cities have already made such changes, including formally erasing the division between urban and rural registration for local residents. But experts have said such changes do not mean much unless welfare, housing and other policies are also changed to overcome persistent inequalities.

In small cities with urban populations of up to one million, people with steady jobs and housing who meet requirements for welfare payments will be allowed to register as local residents. Similar rules will apply to larger cities, with stricter limits.

But the proposals say that for the biggest cities, with urban populations of five million or more, the number of newcomers must be stringently controlled, and a points system will be used to ration household registration opportunities.