[gtirloni]

How does anyone have trust in their governments to provide even basic services? Not where I live.

Still, I'd prefer to try and fix it (for various levels of "fixing") than throw the baby with the bathwater. It's an imperfect system but trusting a corporation is no better.

[xorcist]

Do you not make the distinction between government and state in your language?

The government usually provide little service, but the state do. The question whether you trust it as a single entity is a bit hard to understand. Do you mean trust that my father gets his pension? Or that my kids get a good education? Or that my neighbor who is a doctor can provide decent health care?

I probably trust some of those more and some less, depending on the circumstance. But basing trust on funding model seems intellectually .. challenging. Would I trust a university teacher more if the employer is not a state university? Would I trust a policeman more if working for a private security company?

Not likely. Trust is based on other factors, including reputation and competence.

[Amezarak]

In American English, government and state (in the sense you mean it) are synonyms.

Other countries seem to think of the government as "the current ruling party coalition members holding ministerial positions", so it would be inappropriate to refer to say, the driver's license bureau as "the government", but in the US, you'd never limit the sense of government in that way - you'd say something like "the administration" if you wanted to refer to the federal head of state and department heads, but the current federal executive, the US Congress, your local driver's license bureau, your tax assessor, your state environmental agency are all "the government" in the US.