Taxes are not and never will be because no two people have the same priorities. Even if my favorite charity is only 10% as efficient as the government in doing what I want, a donation to that charity does what the charity does. A donation to the government goes to military, welfare (social security, medicare...), roads, scientific research, and a long long list. If I want to put extra money into say Lymphoma research $10,000 to a really bad lymphoma charity will get $3000 to research (finding a lymphoma research charity that bad is left as an exercise for the reader - the ones I'm aware of are considerably better). The same $10000 to the government will add nothing to lymphoma research since the share of the budget going to that is a rounding error.
Most of the right wing who is against taxes still agree to pay taxes on something. They disagree what taxes should go for and how much, but they generally agree some are needed.
Society is about the compromise. However that compromise makes nobody happy.
100% this. This reminds me of what my SO says: if you have to work, you are not in the upper class. I don't think I agree with this statement fully (I personally think that top decile by income is already upper class), but I feel like I'm becoming more open to re-evaluating my opinion...
Most upper class work. They work different jobs, but they are generally not sitting around retired. They might or might not get a paycheck, but they are working. (if you own a restaurant you will probably pay yourself minimum wage when you do work - dishwashers start at double that - talk to your accountant but this is often the best legal way to handle your hours that are trackable) Steve Job's was famous for taking a salary of $1/year - he clearly was working and upper class.
Most middle class don't have to work either - they are just not willing to accept the lifestyle that forces. Even poor people could find enough savings by 30 to not work if they really want to live that lifestyle. (I don't blame anyone for not wanting to live like that)
Mostly because of a very successful propaganda campaign by people who sought to loot the post-war economic boom
Generally speaking, the sad truth of a complex economy is that coordination is hard, and there's usually a short-term privatized gain to be had by someone willing to poison the future and the commons. No amount of benefit to humanity overall or even the specific society such a person lives in will convince a person who simply doesn't care about anyone else. Fortunately for humanity, a very small minority of people actually operate like that. Unfortunately for humanity, some of them have managed to accumulate a lot of power