In March 2020, the US congress passed the CARES Act. Part of this legislation included the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), whose mission was to sustain small businesses and allow them to remain open in a post-COVID economy.

Executive summary

In order to better assess the performance of our federal government in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, we analyzed the PPP loan distribution to assess if the loans were, in fact, targeted to those populations most heavily impacted by the pandemic. Our report informs the extent to which government intervention was being properly administered during this public health crisis. We yielded measurable objectives that federal and state legislation can strive to meet when distributing future aid relief.

Listed below are our main findings:

• PPP loan program provided high-wage industries and businesses within the professional and business service industry more aid than would be equitable.

• By comparison, workers in the retail and leisure and hospitality industry received far less aid than would be equitable based on revenue and employment losses. 

• Second-wave federal aid should prioritize businesses employing greater volume of low-income workers and within the leisure and hospitality industry.

An overview of our interactive dashboard

For further details, please follow the links below to access our reports: