Category: Current Events

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Current Events

PPP Was a Fraudster Free-for-All

“The scandal is what’s legal, not what’s illegal.”

– Former Justice Department prosecutor Tarek Helou on the hurdles to bringing PPP fraud cases

“The federal government is swamped with reports of potential fraud in the Paycheck Protection Program, according to government officials and public data, casting a shadow on one of Washington’s signature responses to the coronavirus pandemic.”

“About $525 billion in loans were distributed to 5.2 million companies between April 3 and Aug. 8.”

“Banks and the government allowed companies to self-certify that they needed the funds, with little vetting.”

“The Small Business Administration’s inspector general, an arm of the agency that administers the PPP, said last month there were “strong indicators of widespread potential abuse and fraud in the PPP.”

“Tens of thousands of companies received PPP loans for which they appear to have been ineligible, such as corporations created after the pandemic began, businesses that exceeded workforce size limits (generally 500 employees or fewer) or those listed in a federal “Do Not Pay” database because they already owe money to taxpayers.”

“Tens of thousands of organizations also appear to have received more money than they should have based on their headcounts and compensation rates.”

“The Treasury Department in September received 2,495 suspicious activity-reports involving business loans from banks and other depository institutions, more than the total for any year dating back to 2014.”

“Several hundred PPP-related investigations have been opened, involving nearly 500 suspects and hundreds of millions of dollars of loans, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.”

“The Justice Department has charged 73 defendants in PPP-related fraud cases, a spokesman said late last month. Many involve allegations of made-up companies or forged documents.”

“The CARES Act, the March law that established the PPP, effectively used the honor system. If a company had fewer than 500 employees and certified “current economic uncertainty makes this loan request necessary to support the ongoing operations,” it was generally approved.”

“At the PPP’s peak, the SBA approved about 514,000 loans on a single day, May 3.”

“Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in July compared payroll data at PPP-eligible companies to ineligible ones and estimated the program had boosted employment by about 2.3 million jobs. At that rate, the PPP would have cost about $224,000 per job supported.”

“It seems that a lot of that cash went to businesses that would have otherwise maintained relatively similar employment levels,” said David Autor, an MIT economics professor and one of the study’s authors.”

(https://www.wsj.com/articles/ppp-was-a-fraudster-free-for-all-investigators-say-11604832072)

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Current Events

How Trump plowed through $1 billion, losing cash advantage

“They spent their money on unnecessary overhead, lifestyles-of-the-rich-and-famous activity by the campaign staff and vanity ads way too early,” said Mike Murphy, a veteran Republican consultant who advised John McCain and Jeb Bush and is an outspoken Trump critic. “You could literally have 10 monkeys with flamethrowers go after the money, and they wouldn’t have burned through it as stupidly.”

(https://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/trump-plowed-billion-losing-cash-advantage-73708210)

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Current Events

“Government support will account for about 40 percent of total U.S. farm income this year.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/12/us/politics/trump-farmers-subsidies.html
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Current Events Health Humanity

Amy Coney Barrett and the Affordable Care Act

“There’s no argument that’s going to be persuasive enough to shame Senate Republicans to look within themselves and do the right thing.”

“Republicans are also well aware that they’re being hypocrites by violating the precedent they set in 2016 when they refused to consider President Barack Obama’s nominee, Judge Merrick Garland, during an election year.”

“…she will likely be the deciding vote on the Supreme Court in the case to overturn the Affordable Care Act in the middle of a pandemic that has already killed more than 210,000 people in the United States.”

“Given Barrett’s record criticizing the 2012 court decision upholding the law, there can be little doubt about how she would vote. She wrote in 2017 that Roberts “pushed the Affordable Care Act beyond its plausible meaning to save the statute.”

“Any senator who votes for her will be at least partly responsible for more than 20 million people’s losing their health insurance. And they’ll be responsible for insurance companies’ once again being allowed to discriminate against people with pre-existing conditions.”

(https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/amy-coney-barrett-s-supreme-court-hearing-formality-democrats-have-ncna1242888)

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Current Events Humanity Nature

‘Real and imminent’ extinction risk to whales

“More than 350 scientists and conservationists from 40 countries have signed a letter calling for global action to protect whales, dolphins and porpoises from extinction.”

“By far the biggest threat is becoming accidently captured in fishing equipment and nets, which kills an estimated 300,000 whales, dolphins and porpoises a year.”

“The scientists say that more than half of the 90 living species of whales, dolphins and porpoises, are of conservation concern”

(https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-54485407)

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Current Events

Vote for Joe Biden

Vote for Joe Biden.

“There are only two age groups that continue to support Trump… a narrow slice of people older than baby boomers, typically in their late 70s, who have long been conservative…[and] a group of middle-aged people who include the youngest boomers and the oldest members of Generation X”

(https://messaging-custom-newsletters.nytimes.com/template/oakv2?uri=nyt%3A%2F%2Fnewsletter%2F9dbb27a6-e2da-55ea-b329-be1fe6fd780f)

Everyone should vote for Joe Biden, but especially older Americans.

Joe Biden wants to stand up to the abuse of power by prescription drug corporations.

Joe Biden wants to protect and strengthen Medicare as we know it and ensure quality, affordable healthcare for all older Americans.

Joe Biden wants to preserve and strengthen social security.

Joe Biden wants to provide help for older workers who want to keep working.

(https://joebiden.com/older-americans/)

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Current Events Engineering Local

Massachusetts highway exits will be totally renumbered in October

“…the Massachusetts Department of Transportation will change the exit numbering system on all highways crisscrossing the commonwealth in October…”

“The $2.8 million project will change signs to milepost-based exit numbering, complying with a federal requirement. Only 10% of that cost will depend on state highway funds.”

“Exit numbering will correspond west to east on the Mass Pike, south to north on I-93, I-95, I-495, I-91, and U.S. 3.”

“…old exit numbers will temporarily be posted in yellow underneath the new signs…”

(https://www.bostonherald.com/2020/09/25/massachusetts-highway-exits-will-be-totally-renumbered-in-october)

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Current Events Humanity

America’s Divided Mind

“The study found a consistent pattern across measures: Americans incorrectly believe that members of the other party dehumanize, dislike, and disagree with them about twice as much as they actually do.”

https://beyondconflictint.org/americas-divided-mind/
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Current Events Local

Massachusetts shows that a smooth election is possible

“Even though more than 1.5 million people voted, a record for a Democratic primary in the state, wait times at polling places were mostly short. And even though many people voted by mail, the results were available on election night. It was a contrast to the recent messes in Georgia (where lines lasted hours) and New York (where some results weren’t available for weeks).

“How did Massachusetts do so? Mostly by making an effort.

“In July, the state legislature passed an emergency bill that, among other things, mailed forms to all registered voters allowing them to request a mail-in ballot. Local officials set up dozens of ballot drop-off boxes, to reduce mail volume. The state loosened restrictions on who could serve as a poll worker — a particular problem since many existing workers are older and thus vulnerable to Covid-19.

“And the state allowed local officials to begin counting ballots as they arrived, rather than forcing them to wait until Election Day, as some states do.

“All of which indicates that states have the ability to let people vote safely and conveniently during a pandemic. Not every problem will be avoided. In very close races, for example, the outcome may not be known on election night, especially in states (unlike Massachusetts) that count all ballots postmarked by Election Day even if they arrive later. Of course, the closest races have always been uncertain for at least a few days, because of absentee ballots.

“In recent months, some states — like Arizona, Nevada and Pennsylvania — have made meaningful changes to their election rules to prepare for November. But many states have still not done enough, voting-rights experts say. And some politicians, including President Trump, have signaled that they are happy for voting to be difficult, so long as it helps them win.

“Those politicians are making a choice. Massachusetts — along with states that have universal vote-by-mail, like heavily Republican Utah, heavily Democratic Oregon and a few others — has shown what’s possible when public officials decide they want to protect Americans’ voting rights.”

(https://messaging-custom-newsletters.nytimes.com/template/oakv2?uri=nyt%3A%2F%2Fnewsletter%2F1e0808bb-88f9-5c78-9678-cf5b473d536f)

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Current Events Health

America’s death gap

Here’s a jarring thought experiment: If the United States had done merely an average job of fighting the coronavirus — if the U.S. accounted for the same share of virus deaths as it did global population — how many fewer Americans would have died?

The answer: about 145,000.

That’s a large majority [79%] of the country’s 183,000 confirmed coronavirus-related deaths.

No other country looks as bad by this measure. The U.S. accounts for 4 percent of the world’s population, and for 22 percent of confirmed Covid-19 deaths. It is one of the many signs that the Trump administration has done a poorer job of controlling the virus than dozens of other governments around the world.

The specific numbers are only estimates, of course. They are based on virus statistics that are unavoidably incomplete. Most scientists believe the real U.S. death toll is higher than the official numbers indicate, and undercounting of deaths may be even greater in some other countries.

After the U.S., Brazil and Mexico have the next largest gaps between population share and official death share. They are also countries with less advanced medical systems, where some experts think the actual death toll is vastly higher than the official one. If that’s right, the true gaps in Brazil and Mexico may be as large as the U.S. gap.

But no other affluent country has nearly so big a gap. Canada and several European countries each account for a greater percentage of deaths than population, yet the differences aren’t nearly as severe as in the U.S.

And some countries, like Australia and South Korea, have a positive version of the gap. Japan is home to 1.7 percent of the global population but less than 0.2 percent of deaths. An additional 12,000 Japanese residents would not be alive if the country had merely an average death rate.

As I was putting together these numbers, I started thinking about how Americans should have expected their country to fare — above average, below average or maybe right near the average. The U.S. certainly has had some disadvantages in fighting the virus: It’s an international travel hub, which makes transmission more likely, and it had some of the affluent world’s worst health outcomes even before the virus arrived.

On other hand, the U.S. remains the world’s richest country, with vast medical capabilities, and the virus started on a faraway continent. All of which suggests that there was nothing inevitable about the U.S. performance. It is instead a tragic reflection of the country’s failed response.

(https://messaging-custom-newsletters.nytimes.com/template/oakv2?uri=nyt%3A%2F%2Fnewsletter%2F55a5e49d-af65-5d9f-842c-8f0ca369849f)