No, actually they didn't. Unless you consider making over 80K rich.
$80k won't even get you a middle-class lifestyle in the rural south, much less on the coasts...but for some reason people who think working fries at McDonalds is a "career" also think anyone making six figures is driving a Bentley to their helipad.
I live pretty well, certainly middle class, on that amount of money in Oklahoma. However I am far from rich, or even upper middle class. That 80K is the cut off point for stimulus now (150K for married couples)... but the notion that the stimulus is a life changer or even a month's bills for most of us is ridiculous... though it can get to useful levels if you have lots of kids or dependents. We have a guy at work here with 10 kids, so that was a 14K stimulus for him, his wife and their brood.
The stimulus combined with unemployment no questions asked and boosted unemployment and no evictions has hurt employers of lower end pay scale people. I have a friend who need warehouse folks and he just can't find anyone who wants to work for $15 and hour. They make more than that unemployed. I don't know how that's all going to work out longer them but it's like having a dungeon crawl and the fighter stays home. I mean everyone limps along but it's really distorted.
That's fine, small business owners are bad for employees.
This is why we need a roll-eyes smiley.
Look, this is simple economics. If doing nothing were better for the small business employees, then they would be doing that. (and many in the pandemic are, as has been mentioned) If they could have a better job they would. Therefor, by their own choice, they they have proven that their small business job is good for them. That's the beauty of a free economy, people are free to maximize their own outcome. They don't need some socialist pseudo-intellectual to order their life for them or tell them that their choices are wrong. The Soviet Union tried that and we all saw how well that went.
And I don't think you understand the nature of small business. It includes McDonalds, franchises, yes, but many McDonald's are company owned, which of course is anything but a small business. And many small businesses are medical practices, IT shops, accounting firms, and so on. None of those pay minimum wages to skilled employees.