I've often heard within the right constraints, you can be the most creative than you'd ever imagine. And with much of the global society still in lock down, industries and businesses are giving it their all to sustain themselves. In some of this week's articles, I found the creative ad industry using machine learning as a new tool to help with production value in selling...well, ads. We also learn this week about who recently got approved for PPP loans, and it's no shocker the big public companies would try to creatively get a piece of the pie meant for small business. And finally, a history of debt as a creative financial tool which will ultimately get us out of this just like it did in WWII.

Stay healthy & safe.

Fake it 'til you make it... fake

The producers made the commercial by layering video of Mr. Mayne’s 60-year-old mouth onto footage of his 38-year-old face. To many viewers, the stunt provided a welcome moment of levity in depressing times. Others were made uneasy by the smoothness of the patch, describing it as a type of deepfake.

Ms. Brzezinski-Hsu said manipulated footage was likely to appear in future ESPN ads. And executives at several major advertising agencies said they had discussed making similar commercials with their clients in recent weeks.

“We’re so restricted in how we can generate content,” said Kerry Hill, the production director for the ad agency FCB in North America. “Anything that can be computer generated is something we’re going to explore.”

While the blurring of the real and the fake can be amusing on Zoom or in the promotion of snack foods, it presents thorny ethical issues around consent and disinformation. Pornographic deepfake videos, with real-seeming political figures and celebrities in central roles, have circulated on Reddit. A recent doctored video appeared to show Prime Minister Sophie Wilmès of Belgium linking the coronavirus pandemic to climate change. Ahead of the 2020 vote, Facebook and Twitter have said they are closely monitoring manipulated videos.

The bigs in the way of the smalls

Not-So-Small Companies Are Getting Small-Business Loans Under PPP : NPR

The government's $349 billion Paycheck Protection Program had to be thrown together quickly, and the criteria for which companies can receive benefits were kept loose.

The program is primarily intended to benefit small businesses — defined as those with fewer than 500 employees — hurt by the coronavirus pandemic. However, some larger, publicly traded companies have also qualified for loans.

What's unique about the program is that the loans are forgiven if companies retain or rehire employees. So, in effect, many of these companies may be getting millions of dollars of free money.

As a result, the money allocated for the program was quickly exhausted, and Congress is now in talks to extend the program.

Many small businesses have complained about being left out.

Although restaurant and travel companies are among the hardest hit by the downturn, they haven't received the most money. The top borrowers were construction companies (13.1% of the loans so far) followed by professional, scientific and technical services (12.7%), and manufacturing (12%).

The fact that construction companies got the most could be due to their deeper relationships with banks, which may have decided to prioritize them over other companies, KBW Research says.

Debt with an unknown pay back period Link

“How are we going to pay for that?”

With debt, of course. Enormous, hard-to-fathom, piles of debt.

The history starts – as so many important things do – with World War II. It’s the only era in American history with budget figures comparable to today’s.

The budget deficit hit a record in 1943 at 30% of GDP. This year’s deficit, around 19% of GDP, will be equivalent to the deficits run in 1944 and 1945, also during the peak war years. Federal debt as a percentage of GDP is on track to exceed its previous record, set in 1946, next year.

By 1985 World War II debt had effectively been “paid off,” with debt to GDP returning to post-war levels. But between 1945 and 1985 the federal government only ran a budget surplus in six years, all of which were basically accounting quirks. Since 1950 federal debt has increased every year.

World War II debt was never repaid, at least at the aggregate level. Old bonds were repaid with new bonds. But debt kept rising.

It was “paid off” in the sense that the economy grew faster than new debt accumulated

That’s how government debt gets repaid after it piles up. You don’t pay it off. You grow your way out of it.

This isn’t intuitive because it doesn’t apply to people. When a person takes out a mortgage or a car loan, there’s a repayment date. But that’s only because people have finite careers and lifespans, so there’s an “end date” where all debts have to be repaid.

Countries (and to some extent companies) are different. They have indefinite lives. So they can remain indebted indefinitely, even with rising debt.