As someone who could have collected quite a bit of money from this program but didn't need it, this really ticks me off. You're not supposed to apply for the loan/grant unless you are expecting to lay people off.
I'm just a W2 worker but have seen plenty of rationalization around this including "well my competitors are taking the forgivable loans so unless I do I'm at a disadvantage and thus negatively impacted" or "I can't plan 100% for the future and that worries me, so therefore I'm impacted." And that's just the small fishes; a sibling comment mentions our leaders promised to cooperate with oversight then immediately about-faced. No consequences anymore. I know they're supposed to be used for wages but I've seen someone take it anyway as a non-qualifying business because they expect the requirement to follow up with documentation will go out the window since it'll be too much work (to be fair, this last thing was one isolated case).
I think it's unfortunate how much grifting and opportunism goes on, and as we get closer to the election or need to prop up more businesses with more aid, we'll have further programs and rounds with avenues for abuse.
Yes it's wrong that small business are taking money they don't need. But that's because it was essentially used as a slush fund as is now coming to light.
The need more openness in government technology. There should be a platform right now where anyone can look up who received money from this fund larger than some amount.