Six months after the national emergency declaration, businesses continue to face a range of financial pressures. In a new analysis, AAF’s Director of Financial Services Policy Thomas Wade surveys three important ones: the Federal Reserve’s slow rollout of the Main Street Lending Program, pressures on insurers to pay business-interruption claims, and business liability for coronavirus-related claims. All three present both the opportunity and the need for Congress to intervene, Wade notes.

 

An excerpt:

The wave of lockdowns, restrictions on movement, and overall reticence to engage in normal commerce have choked off the income of businesses around the United States. Without further government aid, the temporary closure of hundreds of thousands of small businesses could be permanent by the time the national emergency is lifted. The government’s role must be to provide the financial relief required to keep businesses afloat and not choose winners or losers by vilifying certain industries, from insurers to landlords. Consideration must also be given not just to businesses struggling now but also in the future by providing a federal reinsurance program backing private pandemic risk offerings and by ensuring that businesses have a way of coping with an “epidemic” of potential lawsuits.

Read the analysis.