Comment by mbesto | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mbesto | Hacker News Reader

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> Forgiveness requires documentation on employees retained, wage history, and is capped at $20k/employee maximum. And of course a piece of that comes back to the government in terms of payroll taxes. Just because a company took a 1M loan, doesn't mean it will be 100% forgiven.

I think your misunderstanding is that the rules actually get followed. What happens when everyone in the scheme comes back and says "the economy is shit, we can't pay that regardless" or more optimistically businesses that have 100's of employees that simply plea with the government that they can't repay their loans, but should be given 100% forgiveness in the spirit of "keeping unemployment low". It's far too political to introduce/enforce anything that makes unemployment numbers worse. It's like a "too big to fail" on a much larger order of magnitude.

> the whole point of this program was to get money to businesses quickly. Means testing takes time. Sure there are going to be some questionable loans. Some fraud too. But overall our government has spent a lot more money and gotten worse returns than the PPP.

I consider rape less evil than murder so hey I guess I shouldn't be so critical of rapists! Look, I know those things aren't totally analogous, but the point is that it's OKAY to be critical of the government, especially when a government program benefits those who need it the least.

Why would it be a problem to redesign a social policy in the social interest? So what if everyone one comes and says PPP needs to be amended to do better in service of the country. Isn’t that what we want. It’s a good thing that they increased the spending period from 8 weeks to 24. Most restaurants were closed by state orders and were faced with forcing employees to come off unemployment (and employees resisted because unemployment was way better for them as they got an extra $600 week on top of regular pay) only to then pay them to stay home. Instead, by extending the spending window we give restaurants a fighting chance to have money to start operations again when it’s safe.

Let’s tone down the rhetoric a bit, in no way are PPP loans close to rape or murder in magnitude of harm so it’s an inflammatory analogy with no purpose.

In terms of the actual problems with PPP and percent of bad loans. Think of the counter factual. Would you rather have 1% bad loans or a wave of bankruptcies and layoffs triggering a depression that last 10 years? What about 10% bad loans? 50%?

The PPP was well designed and administered under the circumstances. Let’s make improvements because we are not out of the woods yet. But let’s not scape goat or focus on the edge case problems and then destroy all of the benefits prevented harm.

> Most restaurants were closed by state orders and were faced with forcing employees to come off unemployment

And yet those businesses either didn't get the loans or got a minuscule amount comparatively speaking (especially to those who knew how to game the system).

> in no way are PPP loans close to rape or murder in magnitude of harm so it’s an inflammatory analogy with no purpose

It was meant as a comparative analogy (murder to rape, as PPP to <whatever is worse>) not from (rape as to PPP, as murder is to <whatever is worse>). That was my purpose - two bad immediately recognizable crimes in society with one being considered worse.

> Would you rather have 1% bad loans or a wave of bankruptcies and layoffs triggering a depression that last 10 years? What about 10% bad loans? 50%?

I'd rather have a civil debate about whether that's effective (see Japan's lost decade for comparisons of why quantitative easing has even longer potentially more disastrous issues). You're kidding yourself if you unilaterally think that the PPP program is the only way to alleviate yourself from a "wave of bankruptcies and layoffs triggering a depression that last 10 years". Again, we're just kicking the can down the road, like we always do.

"It's far too political to introduce/enforce anything that makes unemployment numbers worse. It's like a "too big to fail" on a much larger order of magnitude."

Yes and ?

It makes the overall premise of the rules moot. There are no incentives for any business NOT to take advantage; thus creates a zero sum game provided by tax payers that enhances the rich. In other words, it's just kicking the can down the road for the poor to pick up the pieces.

You're not wrong

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