Utilization of Round One of The Paycheck Protection Program

The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) was created when the H.R Bill 758 (Cares Act) was signed into U.S law on March 27, 2020. With the bill, small businesses that were struggling due to the COVID-19 pandemic were able to apply for loans that were forgivable. For this study, we focused solely on the first round of loans that were sent out. We understand that with the ever-changing situation of COVID-19 businesses could receive more loan forgiveness, but we focused on just the first round of loans. This study consisted of email surveys that were sent to small businesses in Texas and Wisconsin to learn about how small businesses utilized the loans they received. The purpose of this study was to see how a small sample of roughly 15-20 small businesses used the loans it received and to formulate trends on the questions that we asked. Our major findings were that one third of the businesses had to lay off employees, most of the businesses used the loans primarily for payroll costs, almost all the businesses are applying for loan forgiveness, and a good number of businesses saw a substantial downturn in revenue compared to other years due to COVID-19.