Stimulus ‘couldn’t come at a better time’
Sluggish restaurants, darkened photography studios, florists with wilting sales, idled sports facilities, unemployed sound engineers and the rest of the Connecticut merchant economy spent Monday trying to sort out a federal COVID relief package that promises badly needed help even as politicians in Washington, D.C. continue to fight over it.
Connecticut’s direct share of the multifaceted, $900 billion federal stimulus bill, known as the CARES Act 2 — which President Donald Trump signed late Sunday after threatening a veto — will total more than $8 billion, Gov. Ned Lamont said in an afternoon briefing. He rolled out charts that showed cash allotments by sector, for example, $210 million for urban bus systems in the state.
The state’s total take could grow to more than $9 billion, depending on how aggres
Rather, the issue is how and whether this $9 billion for the state, on top of a larger amount already distributed in the spring and summer, can find its way into the hands of the people who need it most.
sively Connecticut’s small businesses reach for the money.
A total of 35,000 selfemployed Connecticut residents who were eligible for unemployment benefits under earlier pandemic relief bills saw that benefit expire on Saturday. The bill Trump signed extends those benefits, allowing those workers to receive up to 50 weeks of assistance.
The question is not whether the stimulus is enough to make up for all the personal and business losses forced by the government-mandated recession; it isn’t, but it’s a big help. Rather, the issue is how and whether this $9 billion for the state, on top of a larger amount already distributed in the spring and summer, can find its way into the hands of the people who need it most.
“The stimulus package couldn’t come at a better time because we all know how January and February work in the rest business, it’s survival of the fittest,” said Matt Storch, a celebrated chef and owner of Match in South Norwalk and Match Burger Lobster in Westport. “We usually take December’s fruitful earnings from Christmas parties and propel through the winter months, but that never happened.”
Storch received several hundred thousand dollars under the springtime Paycheck Protection Program and will seek another infusion with this latest stimulus. Under the rules, about 85 percent of the money went directly to his employees, not his fixed expenses that remain as a millstone in the partial shutdown.
“The goal obviously is not to let anybody go,” Storch said, adding that he’s already well below the number of employees he’d normally have this time of year.
And in this stimulus, Match in South Norwalk will qualify but with new rules that businesses must show at least a 25 percent revenue loss in a quarter, he’ll fall just short in the Westport location, which has a strong takeout trade. That’s not right, he said, because restaurants have a very low profit margin, in the range of 3 percent, so even a small decline in sales hits harder than at other types of businesses.
Most regular residents, too, can expect to receive $ 600 per person in the coming days if they earn less than $ 75,000 a year, with amounts phasing down above that threshold. On Monday, the U.S. House voted to bump that up to $ 2,000 with overwhelming Democratic support and a sharply divided Republican caucus.
Most of the 181,000 people now collecting unemployment in the state of Connecticut were not near an expiration date, but all of them will now see an additional $300 a week for 11 weeks. And their regular state benefits will be extended as well.
Looked at as a whole, the federal stimulus stands as a blend of targeted aid to people like Storch and the many small businesses and jobless workers that have suffered the most; and a broad-brush handout to millions of people who may or may not have lost ground.
There’s no way around that. The economy is so complex and has slipped so badly — with unemployment hovering at 8 percent officially, and in reality well higher — that no government programs can piece it back together in a fair way.
For example, in the earlier PPP, many law firms and other intact businesses collected millions of dollars whether they suffered revenue declines or not, as the $ 500 billion program needed to infuse money into the economy quickly.
“It’s mindboggling to me that we have to struggle while these other people are pulling down $ 2 million loans,” Storch said — and in fact, those loand are forgivable and are likely to become outright grants.
Restaurants and selfemployed people stand as the most obvious and immediate beneficiaries most in need, two days after the latest stimulus seemed elusive. Among many others, DJ’s, photographers, musicians and the army of tradespeople plying wrenches, paint brushes and hedge clippers were mostly ineligible for state unemployment until this year.
The new CARES Act brings Connecticut an expected $ 695 million in unemployment benefots across several programs, Lamont said. Those include an 11-week extension of the federal backstop for state unemployment, and an extension of the socalled Shared Work Program that allows employers to cut workers’ hours and not lay them off, as the workers collect partial unemployment benefits.
Other highlights of the omnibus CARES Act 2 for Connecticut:
An estimated $ 1.6 billion to households under the direct stimulus checks of $ 600.
$492 fmillion for kindergarten through 12 schools. “That can be from everthing we need to keep you safe to apprentice teachers and others who can support and help. We’ve already done a lot on technology,” Lamont said.
$ 225 million for colleges and universities, both public and private.
$ 67 million for child care providers.
$312 million for vaccine testing and contact tracing. “We’ve done about $ 250 million worth of testing already,” Lamont said, from the $ 1.4 billion previous federal allotment to the state.
$ 210 million for urban transit. “This will make up for a lot of that shortfall and make sure that the buses will be able to take essential workers to work,” Lamont said.
$ 125 million for general transportation projects, some of it at Bradley International Airport, which has lost huge revenue.
$41.4 million in federa emergency funds that the state will use for funerals benefits to families. “A fair number of folks can’t afford a decent funeral,” Lamlont said. “We’re figuring out how to work with the funeral homes, churches, hospitals.”