Why Government Can’t Create Jobs

This Freeman article from 1993 is more relevant today than ever before.

Government spending, including spending designed to stimulate employment, may be derived from three sources. The first is taxes. If individual income taxes are raised by $3 billion to fund our highway project, disposable income is reduced by $3 billion. Consequently, individuals will demand less clothing, fewer appliances, and so on. Private sector employers will notice and respond by laying off workers. Since most of us will agree that we can spend our income more efficiently than can the government if only for the fact we do not have to pay a bureaucratic overhead charge—lay-offs in the affected companies will exceed the employment added by companies constructing the new highways.