Law firms received the most funds of any industry, followed by restaurants.
by Oliver Morrison
The federal Paycheck Protection Program [PPP] awarded more than $1.5 billion to 10,675 small businesses and nonprofits in the Pittsburgh area during the spring and summer, according to data released in December by the Small Business Administration.
But the size of the loans was based on 2019 payroll data and the program was not designed to evaluate which businesses were most in need — potentially exacerbating some of the local economy’s existing inequalities.
This money supported at least 125,000 jobs at businesses with Pittsburgh mailing addresses, which includes several nearby suburbs. But the actual number of jobs supported could be significantly higher because a quarter of the companies didn’t report their job totals. There were just under 300,000 jobs in the city of Pittsburgh in 2019, according to census data.
Companies were asked to provide their employee data but were not required to. They will, however, have to provide their employee data to their lender if they want the loan to be forgiven, according to a spokesperson for the Small Business Administration [SBA].
The money went disproportionately to the small businesses with the biggest payrolls. The top 1% of businesses receiving PPP loans yielded more than $400 million, more than the bottom 80% of businesses combined. The top 10% of businesses received more than two-thirds of the total local money infused by the PPP.
Although the majority of companies didn’t list the demographics of their ownership, those that did showed businesses owned by white men benefited most from the PPP. Of the nearly 2,000 businesses that listed an owner’s gender, four times as many were owned by men than by women.
And of those that listed a race, 22 times more businesses listed white ownership than Black ownership. There were around 25,000 businesses counted in the city of Pittsburgh in a 2012 census estimate, but as of 2018 only 380 businesses had been certified as a minority or female-owned business in all of Allegheny County.
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PPP poured more than $1.5 billion into Pittsburgh. Did it go to the businesses that needed it most?
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