Government should pay people to dig holes and then fill them

It was not until high levels of unemployment ensued in the 1930s that policymakers in the UK and US started to pay attention to Keynes' powerful argument for active demand management. Before then, whenever Keynes suggested that government should create jobs for the unemployed, he got the retort that this was a bad idea, why not pay people to build roads and schools instead. Keynes would respond saying "fine, pay them to build schools. The point is it doesn't matter what they do, as long as government is creating jobs". Keynes wanted to emphasise the significance of government intervention when the economy is not doing well.
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