cslifer said:
It is odd that you are defending the program so strongly when the waste fraud and abuse associated with the program is so widely known.
I'm not defending it. I think it was a terrible idea in an avalanche of terrible ideas that year. I know there's been fraud and if these local businesses committed fraud eventually they'll be prosecuted and we'll know about. I said I know the program well including the math for determining how much was advanced and how to secure forgiveness. Between the two PPP programs my company handled the entire process from application to forgiveness for probably 45 loans. I'll bet there aren't 10 people in this town that know that program better than I do.
This conversation violates two things I never do in life:
1. Envy someone else for what they have.
2. Assume someone I've never met is a crook with the notable exception of national politicians who are all crooks.
Taking the time to research what someone received in PPP money then complaining about it online in a tone suggesting the recipient has somehow done something wrong despite no evidence violates both of those rules. If you don't like PPP that's fine but blame the politicians who implemented policies that literally threatened millions of small businesses rather than the owners of those businesses who did whatever they could to survive.
Then to complain about price increases in 2022 because someone received a grant that they used to maintain payroll in 2020 once again looks like misplaced rage. Blue Baker isn't raising prices because they want to they're raising them because the raw materials and labor they use to make food are soaring and that's happening in part because of those same destructive government programs. Current inflation isn't greed, that's just absurd. Printing trillions in the wake of Covid has to create inflation, there's no other possible outcome. Then mix in labor imbalances caused by retiring boomers and collapsing Asian supply lines and this is what you get. This was always going to be a difficult decade. Covid and specifically the government's response to Covid only made it worse. Blaming business owners for what we're seeing in the economy is just wrong.