A government’s role is only to provide defence capability and urban infrastructure (roads, water supplies, etc.). All other services (education, health, social security) should be provided by private groups or individuals in the community. Do you agree or disagree?

Debates have long been there on whether a small

government

, which is only responsible for defence and infrastructure

,

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or a big

government

which provides a little bit of everything, is better for

the

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society. As far as I am concerned, a big

government

does have its merits. Apparently, training soldiers and building roads are not the most profitable businesses in the world and

thus

are very difficult to outsource to private sectors. Other public

services

like education, medical treatment and pension

services

can somewhat be privatized, albeit the end-users will need to pay a higher fee. The judgement lies on whether the reduction of tax along with

marketization

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the marketization

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of

such

services

is a better package.

Firstly

, we need to understand that,

private

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the private

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sectors operate these

services

for a profit, and at the end of the day, if the

government

does not provide these

services

, the public will need to pay for the cost of these

services

plus the return of the service provider.

For example

, in the US, the hospitals earn hefty profits and profit margins are even wider than some well-known brands like Nike. In

this

sense, the total costs paid by normal people might be even higher than the tax

otherwise

paid to the

government

to hire civil servants. Apart from the amount of direct out-of-pocket expenses paid by citizens, we cannot ignore the importance of fairness and detrimental effect

otherwise

.

For example

, under a free education mechanism, kids of poor people are given a platform to proceed to higher education opportunities and access to premier schools if they are talented and industrious enough.

This

effectively motivates more people to fight tooth and nail for their future rather than giving up early due to economic constraints.

Consequently

,

this

will

also

enhance the competitiveness of the country and create more work opportunities. In conclusion, considering the potential hike in the total burden of an average person and destruction of opportunities for the lower-income groups that would happen had the

government

only provided basic infrastructure and defence functions, it is more commendable that the

government

should stay large enough to provide a little bit of everything.