You start with both major premises flawed. First, your premise is government should provide goods and services to the population-by citing little and unimportant socialist governments as examples to follow. I do not. Government should generally be providing goods and services only for people that genuinely cannot do so for themselves, and only those goods and services as are reasonably necessary to live a decent life.
The small Eurotrash socialists, like Sweden, the most depressing place on Earth, or New Zealand are simply not analogous to the United States. Those countries have a very different feudal (carried from the UK to New Zealand) histories. Those people have always been subjects of the "sovereign". Part of the duties of the sovereign was to provide for their subjects.
Whatever you want the US to be we were specifically designed to eliminate the subject/sovereign concept. We are a society based on liberty, not the most efficient administration of public welfare, in all its tax subsidized forms. That efficiency is entirely subordinate to the simple metric, each policy should only be adopted if it is consistent with providing the maximum individual liberty consistent with an organized society. You are,
at best, reversing those priorities and making social organization (e.g. efficiency of administering the public dole) the a priori objective. That distinction involves every thought that thereafter follows.
On a less fundamental basis-the little "social democracies" are not useful analogs. Even the largest and wealthiest, Germany and the UK, could not provide the socialist benefits they have were they required to support a military sufficiently large to protect them from their primary military threats. We do that for them. So instead of 100 Leopard tanks Germany should have 1000 if they really are scared of the Russians. At least the British do maintain a helpfully large military, which makes the dole smaller there than the rest of Europe.
They are all small countries compared the us. They have very homogeneous populations, where one size really does fit everyone, hence central control of social and economic organization much more practical. So your real world analogies are misplaced.
As for national feeling its not surprising given the 60 years of Americans hearing how much we suck from, well, you. In spite of that far more people seek to come to the US, from everywhere including the ubiquitous socialist democracies. That's the real measure of where people want to live. If you're not already rich or aristocratic you'll probably never get there in Europe, where hard work, risk taking and entrepreneurship are sacrificed to egalitarianism so the slothful guy that does the minimum is as well treated as the genius that invests a cure for cancer. Hell, you cannot even be fired in France for merely underperforming.
I'm not sure what you're asking but peer reviewed studies kind of leaves me flat. Academia is 95% left or far left, and there are dozens, maybe hundreds of surveys that have tracked this academic phenomena since the 50s. They lead the cultural nihilism that denigrates the United States. Finding someone that already agrees with your conclusion to confirm the conclusion with which they already agree doesn't really mean very much anymore. Its like the Nobel Peace Prize.
However, I agree a great deal of the population is discontented. That is the whole basis of conservative populism. I'm sure you never actually listened to Trump, only the preposterous reporting of what he says, but I'm discontented, and millions like me, because we are heartily sick of the industrial-political complex that is destroying the country. We don't like big banks, big finance, multinational trade deals, bailouts for billionaires, etc... Markets rigged for Walmart but not Joe's Hardware. But as much as we loathe this unholy alliance of big business and big governments we do not want it replaced with socialism, which inevitably leads to authoritarian and eventually totalitarian extinction of liberty. Go speak against he government in the UK and see how quickly you're on a police watch list, and they're the least restrictive government in Europe. Who do you think led the revolt against, for example, the bail outs? Populist conservatives, the entire sweep of 2010. What we have learned in 10 years since is the 5% of our party does whatever it wants. That crew (Riley, Romney, Cheney, Bushes, etc...) are in for a big surprise next year. But I digress as I chuckle about 2022 and Suicide Wednesday on K Street when the primaries are over.
So, I agree we need change, not more Marxism but much less. You display your fundamental Marxism with the urban myth about billionaires and their taxes. I'm no fan of most billionaires but you are explicitly saying we should take more from them and redistribute it other people that purportedly have a greater need for it. From each according to his ability, to each according to their need. You are literally describing the operational definition of Marxism.
I say urban myth for two reasons. Either they are just lying, and I suspect they are, or they are misleading the public by failing to disclose the difference between income tax and capital gains tax. The rate on capital gains is lower because the income that purchased the asset producing the gain was already taxed once, so its a double tax. Couldn't find the most recent year (quickly) cuz I'm tired but the
top 1 % already pays 38.5% of the nation's income tax while earning only 21% of the national income. The top 5% already pay mere fractions of a percent less than 60% of national income tax revenue. The balance skews towards greater imbalance in favor of the lower quintiles when the Trump cuts took effect because the doubled standard deduction, the increased children's credit and a few other new or expanded low income deductions, like state income tax. Effects the wealthy heavily while having a trivial effect on the lower two quintiles. What non Marxist theory of distributive justice could possibly justify 5% of the population supporting more than 60% of the population?
So you want to further imbalance the makers and the takers? I thought we were all in this together?
If the proverbial me already provides the proverbial you with housing, food, education, Obama phones, healthcare and police and fire security what do you do for me, except complain and demand more? That, my friend, is why the country is so broken. Franklin was right when he said: "When the people find they can vote themselves money will herald the end of the republic."
I am not red baiting. You may not be a paleo agricultural communist like Pol Pot but once your justification for taxation hits the "because you have it" point you're marching under the Hammer and Cycle, Comrade. It seems simple because it is the simplest of dialectics. If you find that unpalatable perhaps you should rethink your Marxist premise and reembrace liberty as the vehicle that will restore the benefits of our past through a much smaller government footprint, including the laws that distort markets by protecting multinational mega commercial entities.
I haven't watched the video but I will.
