Taxation as Insurance, Welfare and Entitlements

 A rather abstract discussion which leads to a very specific conclusion about the merger of income tax and employee national insurance contributions Paul Krugman has described the Federal US government as a gigantic insurance company with an army. Can the same thing be said of public spending in most European countries, including the UK? Broadly yes, with one big caveat and some smaller caveats. Indeed, where countries have an army for defensive purposes alone (unlike the US at present) e...