While we can all relate to the author's depressing anecdote about his parents' small Italian restaurant, I wouldn't call the plans to reopen businesses in some

While we can all relate to the author's depressing anecdote about his parents' small Italian restaurant, I wouldn't call the plans to reopen businesses in some places a "pyramid scheme," which implies malevolent intention. A better explanation is provided by Hanlon's Razor: "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence."[a] Everyone -- from the OP's parents to small-time bankers to local politicians to Fortune 500 executives to federal officials -- is trying to figure out how best to cope with this once-in-a-century natural disaster so that we can come out of it with people, institutions, and economies as intact as possible. No one sane would want a breakdown of the existing societal, political, and economic order. -- [a] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon's_razor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon's_razor