Theoretically, supply side economics. Demand side economics makes even liberal economists uncomfortable, because it's so closely tied to inflation of consumer goods. They would rather fund the industries that make the goods, so there are more goods (and jobs producing them).

It's clear that it isn't working, which is why a heretical sect of MMT economics wants to do demand side. It's a big change, the kind that takes a generation dying off to accomplish. Especially since it may not work. It's a genuine unknown, with the primary advantage that we don't already know what kind of regulatory capture it would cause. Which is enough for some, given how badly the current situation is fraying.

It's not an equivalent action. If you print money and use it to buy bonds, then if you ever want to reduce inflation you can just sell the bonds again. Whereas if you print money and give it away then to get it back you have to tax people, which is (a) unpopular and (b) involves 'the government bailing out the central bank'.

Why not give away printed money and raise interest rates on the backend?

Depends on which side actually needs the money.

You cannot make an absolute statement that consumers vs businesses deserve more money, you have to look at the current market.

However, the central banks have opened the flood gates for supply side monetary stimulus. It's not unreasonable to think that the demand side has been neglected massively and that money should be put into the demand side instead.

Well, the first question is: how much money?

That question is usually answered by the people willing to take out commercial loans. Without the market supplying that function, you’d have to try and figure this out yourself centrally.

The second issue is that you really are spraying money evenly across the whole economy, effectively starving productive ventures of capital while at the same time endowing moribund ventures with it instead.

So it’s not quite an equivalent scheme, it has different benefits and costs.

Because in a democracy, effectively granting the legislature the power to print money and hand it to citizens is fraught with some pretty obvious conflicts of interest.

(yes I know the Fed is “independent” but it is the tail on a government dog—the two are separated only in name)

Is the peril greater than giving money to large financial corporations? Extremely Large corporations often lobby or directly corrupt their surrounding regulatory authorities.

That's still really bad for the unbanked in the US.