Fire differs remarkably from other natural disasters because of its close relationship with human behaviors, which are affected by socioeconomic factors. In this article, research on the relationship between socioeconomic factors and fire in China is presented. Correlation analysis shows that in China, socioeconomic factors have a notable influence on fire. But the degree of correlation between them is different from that in other countries. In China, tendency of fire incidence and serious fire situations occur with the development of economy, which is a distinctive characteristic of the relationship between fire and socioeconomic factors. The fire data from China sounds paradoxical between two periods under study and the research indicates that fire rate has a poor relationship with college education, while in developed countries they are revealed as negative correlation. Finally, we discuss how socioeconomic factors influence fire and some predictions made on the fire situation in China.