I don't know, it got the US out of the Great Depression.
Work programs can be great, if you're doing valuable work that helps the public and strengthens your nation. The US, to this day, has the largest public work program - the military. If you think about what the military actually is, it's a work program.
I'm not against make-work per se, but we are currently in an era where we need to improve public sector administrative capacity. It's really hard to do that while saddling agencies with make-work, because the latter is so bad for esprite de corps.
It would better to e.g. expand peace corps / Americorps. And if they want to staff do-nothings on subways, they can, but it needs not involve the MTA.
the made up work should benefit society at large instead of a small group of unionized and politically connected employees. maybe we could spend the second operator's salary on, for example, building elevators for ADA compliance.
I don't know, it got the US out of the Great Depression.
Work programs can be great, if you're doing valuable work that helps the public and strengthens your nation. The US, to this day, has the largest public work program - the military. If you think about what the military actually is, it's a work program.