The same people demanding more taxes to pay for compassionate government are the same people who are wrecking the economy thus creating “darwinist” conditions.
Its a trick question. Turn the economy around and there will be plenty of money for government largesse. Even the ineffective kind. Keep driving the economy into the dirt and there won’t be any money for anything.
In any case, the problem isn’t just taxes; people have a bad habit of using the tax issue as shorthand for the real issue which is government intervention in the economy, government intervention in private lives, and regulatory agencies that have become predatory. The government wrecks an industry and then wrings its hands over the poor who used to have jobs. And demands to fix the problem by means of further intervention.
I get your point. But I'm old enough to remember a successful electronic manufacturing industry, also automobiles and computers which were highly successful both for profit and jobs that they are no more. I think blaming government [of both parties] is an overreach. I know the other pinata is unions but they were stronger during the hay days. IBM was not unionized nor did GE pay a lot of taxes.
The USA needs a way for its citizens to exist without government support in the emerging world-wide Darwinian economy.