Cyclo I think you may have missed one of my posts on the bottom of the first page, I hate being the last post on a page:\
Also, while I understand where you are comming from, ultimately its a trade-off. Society and Government are made of every individual that is a part of it. For the most part, the majority usually has control over what's what, even if that is more taxes and restrictions. We accept this because ultimately its somewhat of a small trade-off for what we gain; public schools, hospitals, fire departments, but also we gain things like a standard currency, and access to a mass clientele. You may lose out some of your money to the pitfalls of society, but in the long run having a market to sell things to and a standard of doing work and getting paid is worth it. Most people get "rich" or make vast wealth by selling to the masses I would think, which would be near impossible if there were no "society" or a giant "connection" or people. In the end, you have to choose between losing some of your money to the wolves and still living good, or having every cent you earned right alongside you on a deserted island.
The problem is well illustrated in your list of what we "gain" from taking part in society:
1. Public schools: public schools are a huge scam, are much more expensive per student than private schools, and nearly always give an inferior education. There are always exceptions, but here they are few and far between. Thus, if the government stopped spending the money of private citizens on public schools, private schools would pop up to fill the supply gap and the quality of education would likely increase while the percentage of GDP spent on this education would decrease.
2. Hospitals: the best hospitals in this country are private. Public hospitals generally perform at a far lower level than an equivalently funded private hospital. If you were sick in St. Louis and had a choice, would you go to the John Cochran VA hospital (a government-run hospital), or to Barnes-Jewish (a private hospital associated with Washington University School of Medicine)? Only an idiot would choose the government hospital. Yet the budgets for the two are very similar, and the same arguments I made for public schools largely apply here.
3. Fire departments: fire departments used to be private, and why not? Early in this country's history, fire departments were private and citizens would pay to cover their houses. If you go to Charleston, SC, you can still see the emblems of the various fire companies on the houses they covered. Now, fire departments are unionized and have driven their costs through the roof in many cities, forcing the cities to make hard decisions about how many employees they can afford. It's not politically feasible to fire a fireman, after all, and since it is a public monopoly, there is no rational basis for setting a wage. If you look at the news from my home town of Muncie, IN, you will see that this is a real problem, especially in smaller communities. Its population has declined from 80,000 to close to 60,000 over the last 20 years, but the number of firefighters has stayed the same. The per capita income has similarly dropped, but the wages of firefighters has continued to rise. Privatizing these fire companies would force them to break even, setting a rational basis for wages and likely decreasing costs for everyone who wants coverage. If you have a mortgage, your bank would probably require you to have coverage from one of these companies, so they could negotiate the rates for you.
I think these points are an excellent way to illustrate that things which have always been seen as necessary functions of government are actually better performed by non-government entities.
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