Hamdi Ulukaya, a Turkish immigrant, started making Chobani yogurt with the help of a Small Business Administration loan. He bought a Kraft Foods factory in 2005 with the help of that loan, and he began shipping Chobani Greek yogurt two years later. It is now the best selling yogurt brand in the U.S. He is now estimated to be worth 1.1 billion dollars.
Of course, the government didn't make him a billionaire. He and many other people had to do a lot of work to produce and sell all that yogurt. But could he have started without the SBA loan? Maybe if there had been a friendly banker who believed in him. So, the government didn't make him a billionaire, but it certainly gave him a rung or two to start the climb to success.
See "The billionaire behind Chobani", Devon Pendelton, Bloomberg News, Updated 2012-09-25, via Star Tribune.
Something else to consider: was the SBA loan government spending or government investment? Consider all the jobs that Chobani created and the taxes the employees pay. Consider how much more taxes Ulukaya paid than if he hadn't been so successful. Consider how those taxes in turn can be reinvested in education, roads, and loans to other fledgling companies.
