At the end of the day, it comes down to how much you trust government with your money. At the end of the day, i don't. At all. And there are plenty of obvious reasons why.
Just for example, gas taxes exist supposedly to pay for roads, etc. but often they get redirected to other things. In Florida there is a state run lottery that started back in the 1980s. The profits were supposed to go to schools. It makes an obscene amount of money. I don't know where the money is going but sales taxes go up, property taxes go up (as a percent) and never go down. Yet they don't have enough money to pay teachers a reasonable salary. It's absurd. So, while I don't believe that NO government is the answer, I also don't believe that MORE government is the answer and firmly believe it is way too big as it is. "Big" defined here basically refers to what percent of the economy they control.
Government should be there for basic services and arguably as a safety net. The problem is that "safety net" has grown to become all encompassing control of wide swaths of people's life. Monopoly's are not generally good which is why I'm not a fan of the idea of single payer healthcare. It reduces competition, increasing overall costs and slowing progress. Government as a safety net health care provider for those that can't afford it? Maybe. But inevitably these things seem to grow out of control.
The Affordable Health Care Act (A.K.A. Obamacare) you would assume was designed to make health care more affordable. For SOME people it did by enabling them to get insurance when they otherwise would not have been able to. However, it had the effect of reducing competition among insurance companies and for MOST people increasing insurance costs (which were already quite expensive) a SIGNIFICANT amount. So trust government in these matters? Not likely.
At the end of the day, people should be responsible for themselves. I'm not saying they shouldn't get help if they need it but it shouldn't be the government's base job to take care of you. The government is not your mommy and it is not your daddy. If I wind up in the hospital because I'm not wearing a seatbelt then that should be MY responsibility. Fining me for it is stupid. Note: I always wear my seatbelt but that is and should be my decision. The logical extension of the idea that government should make you pay for risky activities that might incur a cost to society (mainly because government has elected to pay for such costs in the first place) is to simply ban everything. Fast food? banned. Cigars? banned. Alcohol? banned. Watching too much TV? banned. Honestly, that's not the society I want. Lets go the other direction. If my actions incur a cost then I should pay for it. If they don't, stop stealing my money. We teach kids to be responsible. Why can't adults be?