I think now is a really hard time to ask "what have my tax dollars gotten me?"
- We all got free vaccines, produced in record time.
- A lot of people are getting the child tax credit.
- A lot of people got extended or expanded unemployment benefits.
- Some jobs were sustained by PPP funding.
- A lot of people were able to stay in their homes both because of eviction moratoriums and rent repayment programs.
- Literal military personnel were setting up and staffing hospitals.
Sure, you might say, but all these things are temporary responses to a short-term-ish crisis. And that's true; and that's also partly what the state is for, right?
But in normal times, I was raised middle class and:
- I went to 3 public schools and a state university
- Growing up my parents regularly took me to the public library. I later became a volunteer there.
- When I commuted daily, it was on public transit.
- I backpack in USFS wilderness zones. I maintain a plot at a community garden managed by my city's parks department. When it's sunny I run through a park with a literal polo field.
- When I am choking on wildfire smoke, I know that state and federal firefighters are trying to control it.
- I haven't had the time yet, but I want to take free Spanish classes at my city's community college.
- I drink clean municipal tap water and flush into a municipal sewer.
- And basically every item I've bought has traveled over public roads, bridges, etc, which I navigate with GPS.
I'm not saying we get a good deal. Public spending is often laughably inefficient or downright corrupt. But to pretend one doesn't benefit at all seems like it's failing to notice a lot of the fabric of our world, or appreciate how much worse it could be.
- We all got free vaccines, produced in record time.
- A lot of people are getting the child tax credit.
- A lot of people got extended or expanded unemployment benefits.
- Some jobs were sustained by PPP funding.
- A lot of people were able to stay in their homes both because of eviction moratoriums and rent repayment programs.
- Literal military personnel were setting up and staffing hospitals.
Sure, you might say, but all these things are temporary responses to a short-term-ish crisis. And that's true; and that's also partly what the state is for, right?
But in normal times, I was raised middle class and:
- I went to 3 public schools and a state university
- Growing up my parents regularly took me to the public library. I later became a volunteer there.
- When I commuted daily, it was on public transit.
- I backpack in USFS wilderness zones. I maintain a plot at a community garden managed by my city's parks department. When it's sunny I run through a park with a literal polo field.
- When I am choking on wildfire smoke, I know that state and federal firefighters are trying to control it.
- I haven't had the time yet, but I want to take free Spanish classes at my city's community college.
- I drink clean municipal tap water and flush into a municipal sewer.
- And basically every item I've bought has traveled over public roads, bridges, etc, which I navigate with GPS.
I'm not saying we get a good deal. Public spending is often laughably inefficient or downright corrupt. But to pretend one doesn't benefit at all seems like it's failing to notice a lot of the fabric of our world, or appreciate how much worse it could be.