[sokoloff]

To me, it's not just "could be addressed via charity" because most anything could be, but it's more about how essential the service is.

Basic education, housing, medical care, and food/water are areas that are so essential that having them be government run makes sense to me. I'd still prefer them to be as-local-as-practical, since I believe that accountability of government is increased the more local government is. I don't want the United Nations running my local elementary school as an extreme example.

I think that allowing for non-profit/charitable causes to exist and to have contributions to them be tax-deductible is still beneficial to society. I don't want the government deciding which churches are worthy of existing (that's problematic on multiple levels) and neither do I want to penalize someone who believes their church provides important enough community services to be worthy of support over someone else who believes that an art museum or the opera is worthy of support (whether that was via-government or via-donations).

There is no amount of government efficiency in supporting churches that would cause me to turn that over to the government.

There is no amount of private efficiency in providing for national defense that would cause me to turn the military over to private interests to run.