[risk]

Many people here have offered solid evidence that "make work" programs were no help - that, in fact, they were counterproductive.

But those people had food to eat and a place to live. You can call that "counterproductive" all you like but you'll have a hard time persuading people who benefited from them that they were just a huge mistake that never should have been attempted.

Nero played violin while Rome burned, too.

[eno_]

I don't want to argue other peoples' position for them, but IF they are correct that New Deal programs were counterproductive, then all they did was move the misery around. For all the people that got jobs that way, there were others who were poorer longer because of them. That's what I mean by "counterproductive."