What are taxes good for?

I believe that our government has gotten too big to be efficient. The money that is collected in taxes and then spent on pork barrel projects "projects for us as citizens supposedly", would have been better simply left in our pockets. The basic process of collecting taxes is in it self inefficient. Not to mention that the countless hands it must pass through before finally returning to benefit us the taxpayers. Yes, we do need roads and bridges but do we need state funded malls? There are things we can all agree that we need the government for. Such as protection ,but do we really need a bridge to nowhere? We need education for ourselves and our children as well as affordable medical services, but should we be paying 8 times the going rate for prescription medications.

The only good I can imagine coming from high taxes is a socialist goal. Closing the gaps between peoples income levels. Since the extremely rich would rather get extremely richer rather than pay there employees better. We do need something to step in and force them to continue to pass the wealth along. If you consider how a monopoly works it is quite similar to the problem with ever increasing polarization of wealth. Because Walmart has Billions of dollars they can charge very cheap rates for there products. Because they have billions of dollars they can hang around until they drive other smaller businesses out of business. After they have succeeded in defeating the competition they can then raise prices because there is no competition left. As well they can pay very low wages because the only alternative for many people is being unemployed. So now that wall mart has raised prices you would think they would pay there employees more but instead, the people at the top pocket most of the benefit and an ever decreasing percentage is passed down the chain. Also as more profit is made inflation kicks in and the smaller growth percentage of the lower ranks is even further reduced.

If you look at the industrial revolution and the use of children in factory work you will see a startling example of the effect of greed in economics. Because children could be paid very little and could operate machinery as well as adults, the factory owners could pay adults very little as well as children. Because factories produced goods much more cheaply and quickly. The people who previously made goods by hand were put out of business. Now they half to work in a factory ran by a greedy rich person and there children are losing fingers in the machinery. Because of the advent of technology it is no longer in most cases, cost efficient to make things by hand. The problem is that factories require very few owners and a lot of workers. If the owners can pay the workers very little than the benefit of the factory only serves the owner.

With all of our technological advances we can produce staggering amounts of goods more cheaply and efficiently than ever before. Is it really right for a hand full of rich people to reap the rewards while the rest of our nation struggles to get by. It's a very clever form of coerced slavery if you ask me. While there is definitely many degrees of opportunity here in America the fact is, there are only so many positions to be filled. I believe it's a pyramid shaped economy with the few wealthiest at the top and the many poor at the bottom. While we are such a rich nation that even our poor are fat, the belief that we can all be rich if we work for it is a fallacy. It simply isn't true especially considering that those with money will pay those who work for them as little as they can get away with regardless of the profit made by the business.
If extremely wealthy people paying higher taxes is socialism than I'm a socialist.