Many people (myself include) bemoan paying taxes. You might not agree with the lawmakers and policies for spending tax dollars but it does help people. The fundamental disagreement centers around who it helps and how much it helps, not that it helps at all.
Maybe we’re thinking about it all wrong.
Paying taxes is an index fund where you pay in one place and it is distributed to thousands of state sponsored causes. The mix of these causes changes over time but, if you think about it, it’s a highly efficient mechanism for allocating money that would be impossible to do at such a large scale yourself.
Could it be better? Absolutely, but like an index fund, it’s a blend of a thousand things and there is baby/bath-water problem if you think we should just never have to pay taxes.
See also:
- Civilization is composed of fast layers and slow layers, governance is one of the slower layers
- Governments are comfortable thinking long term when it comes to infrastructure
- Taxes might also be the only way