There are ways it can be done more "cheaply" that via infrastructure development. This is mainly done by lowering the capital required in the jobs it pursues, so that a higher percentage of the job is paid out in wages rather than actual output generation. But then, depending on what the actual outputs of the projects are, you'd be better with an unemployment package where technically *all* (realistically almost all) of the inputs go into paying for people.
A large part of the supposed problem here is that unskilled labor isn't as valued highly as it used to be (For a variety of reasons; market glut, resource pooling, alternative markets etc.), except for in situations where regional arbitrage doesn't work as well. Knowledge work tends to be valued, and a lot of those places are actually hiring. But we're built on a model which all but requires an certain employment level close for sociological reasons, legacy industry requirements etc, and trying to shift from that model is really hard.