[fragmede]

There are two things. One is that something things it doesn't make sense to have multiple companies offering multiple versions. Specifically, right in front of my house, there's no place for a dozen companies to put multiple roads for me to get to work on. it's a highly un-free market because of physical limitations. For those, a simplistic model makes sense. Everyone contributes to a pot which is used to pay for maintenance because everyone benefits. Other things, it makes sense because the indirect nature of its benefits means the short sighted will opt out of. Eg elementary schools for children. If you don't have, and don't plan on ever having kids, you'd opt out of paying for that, but it's in your best interests not to have an uneducated population for a lot of reasons. Or take hospitals. As a young healthy person who's never needed to go to the hospital, you'd opt out of paying for them, only to have problems when you do get old and need to go to one. Hell, if I don't drive and don't have a car, I'd shortsightedly opt out of paying for road maintenance or the DMV, only to realize that I rely on that. Same for a vast number of other services that you don't see or need every day. How often do you think about the supply chain that supports the water treatment plant when you flush the toilet?

It's an interesting thought experiment, but it fundamentally misunderstands the reason for government to exist, which is not to turn a profit.

[valty]

> If you don't have, and don't plan on ever having kids

Then you don't pay for their services, and other people pay more.

Most people don't want an uneducated population so they pay for them.

Government is this strange beast where we continuously seem to vote and pay for all these things we value at the ballot box, but then given the individual choice we change our mind. Or its a matter of "I won't if they don't". Which I guess creates the problem of excludability...if one group is paying for something that those who don't pay for it can't be excluded from...then it's unfair. Then it kind of comes down to everything being modeled as "insurance", such that you are guessing into the future as to what might happen to you and what you might need, and paying based on that.

Maybe its a convenience thing - it takes too much time.

> if I don't drive and don't have a car, I'd shortsightedly opt out of paying for road maintenance

I mean if you drive on the road you should pay more. And with modern tech we can now track road usage very precisely.

The *shortsightedly" argument could be resolved with civic education. People need to be more informed about these things. Or its like: if you don't pay for roads, then you get surcharged by any service you use that uses the roads.

> which is not to turn a profit

Government is then essentially a bunch of not-for-profits. But instead of multiple tackling the same problem, there is only one.

Nothing implies a need to turn a profit.

Those working in the public sector are incentivized by government committee scrutiny, who are incentivized by winning elections.

So you essentially have a bunch of people who do things for reasons other than money. It's a bit like open source software.

Some people will do things simply because they see there is a better way of doing them, and they enjoy doing it, and perhaps derive secondary benefits like prestige and fame.

By not voting for the "zero tax" party, people continuously show that they derive benefit from the services that their taxes pay for.

[fragmede]

> By not voting for the "zero tax" party,

In the US, one of the parties champions small government, which implies lower taxes, and they get plenty of votes.

People are generally good, but they are also selfish as all hell. Everyone could use a bit more money though, and therin lies the problem. If there's any way I can get more money, I'm going to do it. Civic education be damned, the only thing I'm going to fund is things that go back into my pocket. I don't need the police (until I do), I don't need firefighters (until I do), I don't need school teachers at all. Sure, the long term effects of that are going to be bad, but I need just a little bit of money now to help with things, and someone else is gonna pay for those things, so why should I bother. People are gonna min-max the system because they care about what they care about. Schoolteachers are going to give all their money to the schools, because it goes back into their pockets, and the military is going to fund the military.

Money itself is a construct. We could just abolish it. With machines, we have long surpassed the need for everyone to work. We can have one cadre of people who do the work of feeding and housing everyone, and then everyone else gets to go out and play. Unfortunately, reality kicks in, humans are gonna human, and that's not gonna work. So we're left with money to organize our society, and we give money to the government to spend on what they spend our taxes on.

[valty]

> small government

A different spin on "small".

I wonder if you could have micro-governments instead on a per-topic basis with their own mini-budgets.

These omnibus spending bills seem absurd.

The tax should be incurred/realized at the point of the benefit received.

Imagine getting a monthly bill on your estimated tax spend with details of everything it is spent on and how that benefit flows through to you. This might make people more receptive to government.

Also thinking about a Government+ premium subscription service. How can the government offer added benefits to raise more money for things. I guess this is charity.

[fragmede]

Attribution is incredibly hard but would be amazing to see. My tax dollars 15 years ago paid for a child's education, and that child is now a productive member of society. A magic system that showed my tax dollars flowing through to that child having a stable job and a home instead of being out on the streets and committing violence, being a drug addict, would be eye opening.

The idea of Government+ rankles me. We have lost sight of the founding preamble, that all men are created equal, under God. It has evolved to include people of all color, and other genders, and religion is not as much of a focus, but those parts are okay. What i have a problem with is the idea that rich people are better than poor people. In charging money for things, the poor get excluded, and Government+ will leave them behind. Charge money for things because that's how the system works, but also recognize that having carpool lanes instead be express lanes where they just charge money to use them is classist.

[valty]

> showed my tax dollars flowing through to that child...would be eye opening

I agree. Charity's often use this for marketing. Making clear the direct human impact of your donation. Tech companies like Apple do this a lot too.

But when a government talks of its successes in statistics...I don't think about my tax spend. I think that it was my (and other people's) vote for that team that did that. And typically not even the team...rather the leadership of the political party.

It's like a shift in the marketing approach.

We sent 100bn to this country to help out with this.

vs.

Average Joe paid 10$ of his income last year which helped pay for this and that for these people. One of those people today was Sally... One of those people 15 years ago was Tracy...