“Subsidies, Guarantees and Covid Loans: A Tricky Mix for SMEs”

The Zug comedian Michael Elsener is a national star. The fact that he and his company with several employees received around half a million francs in corona compensation and subsidies caused displeasure in the Zug cultural scene. Is there more to it than the usual distribution battle for subsidy pots? Rather not. It smells conspicuously after an inner-cultural envy debate, as our newspaper noted on Friday.

Critical questions about the basic mechanisms of cultural subsidies are nevertheless indicated. On the one hand in terms of the size and number of honey pots and on the other hand in the award criteria for taxpayers’ money.

As is well known, stately A-fonds-perdu payments from public coffers to the cultural industry are courantly normal. That’s not bad per se, culture can be of value to us. However, since we are in times when the number of company bankruptcies is rising to higher levels than before the pandemic, such cultural payments contrast ugly with the unsubsidized everyday realities of many SMEs. For example, the Corona aid loans for companies suddenly bear interest: 1.5 percent up to 500,000 francs (previously: 0 percent), 2 percent if the loan amount is higher (previously: 0.5). The Federal Council decided on March 29 on the basis of the Covid 19 Solidarity Guarantee Act, and by no means all borrowers had this system change, which was provided for in the small print, on their radar.

This causes irritation in many places. Because depending on the lender, the bank notices have only arrived in the last few days – with the note that the interest has to be paid retrospectively since April 1st. It is only understandable that this arouses displeasure a few days after the Federal Council provided assistance in the CS debacle. A beverage retailer from the region writes to our newspaper: “The federal government is guaranteeing billions of francs to save CS-Bank, which has paid out millions in bonuses even though it has been doing negatively for several years. We small businesses are now supposed to pay interest and the rich bankers get off scot-free! Someone should understand that!”