NPR: Over $200 billion in pandemic business loans appear to be fraudulent, a watchdog says

sendingmath@kbin.social to News@kbin.social – 229 points –
npr.org

The Office of Inspector General of the Small Business Administration has released a "landscape of fraud" report highlighting why 17% of PPP and other loans appear bogus.

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So we're going to pursue PPP fraud as aggressively as welfare fraud right?

Or do we have separate systems for the rich and for the poor?

All while actual, legitimate small businesses were often told the funds were already gone, during the first round of PPP, before the applications were even live.

Good thing all the multi millionaires got money for their businesses.

I was told it was welfare recipients that were ripping off the taxpayers. Are you telling me that the job creators perpetrated massive fraud!?!

US politicians need to stop sucking "job creator" dick. "Job creator" is basically just another way of saying "someone who doesn't do the work but makes work for other people and benefits from their labor".

I believe they've once been called: "He who holds the shovel" and "He who holds the rifle."

At the time, government officials said the potential economic emergency posed by the pandemic shutdowns of 2020 necessitated a quick loans — despite the likelihood of fraud.

"There is something to that argument, especially when it's applied to the very early weeks of the program," says Sam Kruger, an assistant professor of finance at the University of Texas who has studied pandemic fraud. But he says the data analysis behind this new report shows the government did have the ability to tighten up the system.

I wonder who keeps insisting on deregulating the system. That turned out to be a bad move.

Yeah good thing we did this! Can you imagine if we didn't? There would be rampant inflation and the economy would be in shambles. Businesses would be closing left and right. Sounds like a nightmare. Really glad we avoided all of that.

Regulation seems completely unrelated, this was the human need to "do something, anything". Perhaps you can elaborate on the link and relieve my ignorance.

I should have defrauded a bunch of PPP loans to help people with their college loans.

I legitimately wish I thought of this sooner. Also would help if I had a company to apply with lol. It seems like there was literally nothing stopping this from happening if someone thought of it/was willing to take the risk.

There was plenty to stop it, namely huge corporations swooping in to grab them before smaller companies even had the chance.

In economic aid packages like this, the goal is to spread money around in hopes people will spend it. Drop the cash from a helicopter, give it to random citizens, it doesn't actually matter so long as the money goes out the door.

Except if you give it to rich cunts it usually ends up padding their bank accounts instead of being spent on things like food and clothing. Giving money to rich people is a very inefficient form of stimulus. Not to mention just morally not great. $30 spent on champagne stimulates the economy pretty similarly to $30 spent on basic necessities, but the latter is much more helpful to individuals.

The pandemic unemployment assistance was one of the greatest social programs our stupid country has ever done. The PPP loans were a terrible replacement.

What? Haven't you heard about trickle-down economics? Are you saying trickle-down doesn't work?!?!

Except it really does. If you give a billionaire a thousand dollars they're gonna sit on it. If you give a poor person a thousand dollars they are gonna spend it on things they need.

Is that true? All I heard was “nobody wants to work anymore” six months after getting the stimulus checks. Surely the poor were able to turn their $1,400 into millions, right? /s

Which is exactly why people that didn't need the money should be investigated but people that actually used it, even if they didn't need whatever they spent it on, should be left alone.

If we dropped a million dollars from that proverbial helicopter but $900,000 was captured in a safe by Bezos and never distributed throughout the economy, it's just a gift and not effective at the original goal at all.

Like my old company who got ppp loans even though our government contract wasn't disrupted and we all just went to wfh

The PPP loans were terribly managed. I hope they manage to claw more money from scammers and invalid business

Tell me more about how college debt forgiveness is unfair. /s

This was as designed. "COVID Cash" was a criminal fraud upon US citizens.

Much better use would have been given to people directly. They could have spent it on business.

Not businesses that were closed.

Or business at all. They aren't living breathing things. It's the people who matter

This is why I was in the "give it to businesses to pay their employees" camp. I thought it was a great idea. I foolishly did not foresee the massive amounts of fraud happening.

In my city the local government is just throwing free money to local commercial property owners if they promise to renovate. Except it always goes to the same people. They buy a building and get a $1 million. When it is all over they'll just dump the property, making a killing.