Quote from nitro:
I actually think that the government has done too much in giving away stuff, when instead it should put that money to work by hiring people to build bridges/roads and/or repair them, clean up wastelands, and other government spending. But the batton has to be passed on to business at some point, and it is their turn to take risk, for the sake of us all.
Anyone who has had to manage the P&L of a business, especially one which answers to outside shareholders, will tell that if they did this, they would be out of a job soon after, as would the "extra" workers they hired.
If I am a hiring manager, do you think I'm going to put my own employment at-risk to hire more people than I need for some abstract social good? Not likely. I will only hire if I anticipate demand. Even then, I can't just hire anyone, I have to hire people with the right skills to meet that demand. From what I've read, there is a big skill gap between many of the unemployed and the jobs that are being created. This shows up in the differentials in unemployment rates among various demographics, with some demographics (graduate-degreed) being at essentially full employment and others (youth, new college grads) being at levels of unemployment even beyond the Great Depression.