To be fair, more taxes is not the immediate answer to America’s problems that people think it is. The average American already pays more in taxes than most Europeans. The real issues come from the fact that the US Govt. can not legally produce goods or services (only in very specific circumstances) and has to contract it out to private companies. See roadwork and infrastructure maintenance as one of the most obvious examples. Regional companies exercise an uncontested monopoly on these contracts, causing budgets and schedules to balloon several times past what they would if handled by a service that was directly funded and administered by public office.

Americans already do pay more. The problem is that they get less for their money than any other western nation. While I don’t agree with the conclusion, it’s not hard to see why so many people watch their country fall into disrepair- despite paying more taxes than ever- and say “to hell with it, I’d rather keep my money than throw it into the corrupt bureaucracy who won’t even do anything.”