I'm not under any illusion that "private property" is some kind of perfect solution (even libertarians schism into geolibertarians, libertarian socialists, etc. around the sticky issue), but let's not fly off into pure philosophy land here. This situation is pretty direct: the federal gov't, and by extension NASA, skims off my paycheck to fund what it thinks are noble endeavors.
Unfortunately this leviathan that nobly funds NASA also spends trillions dropping bombs on brown people halfway across the planet, funding revolutions to topple governments, and violently suppressing victimless crimes (e.g. drug use, prostitution) that have a very real negative impact on my life and the lives of others I have no qualms with.
If we could decide which systems to voluntarily contribute to, which ones would be funded?
But you can look at it the other way around: the US government is good enough to let you have your paycheck. Why do you assume the money is yours to begin with? The gov't also spends money on police and roads so that you'd be able to earn your paycheck, so it seems to me like it's doing the hard work for you.
And as to voluntary choice, why do you think that voluntary choice by the individual is more important than the choice of society as a whole? After all, you have a democratically elected government, so it represents the set of deals or compromises struck by the members, and various groups of members, that form society. How is that not voluntary? Who says your own individual will is more important than that of society? It seems to me that the current system is a lot more voluntary than the one you're proposing. In the current system deals are formed to pool resources together to achieve common goals. Because pooling resources is required to achieve some goals, how would that be achieved in your system? My guess is that people who have accrued more wealth (thanks to the government's work) will use their influence to advance the goals they desire, without taking into any account the will of most other people. Is that fair?
To me, it sounds like you're saying "Don't be upset at your husband for beating you, you're lucky he's letting you live at all!" After all, ownership of wives by husbands predates feminism by more than a few millennia...
Private property is an enlightened concept based on the fact that a person's own labor is his and not the property of the state/tribe to appropriate at will.
I was just playing devil's advocate to explore a different point of view. But if you're talking about enlightened ideas, then welfare states are also an enlightened idea predated by centuries of feudalism (which a private-property-based society with little or no government looks like).
And the tribe didn't appropriate the individual's labor. It was naturally assumed that if you're a member of a tribe (that you rely on for survival) then your work should benefit the tribe -- not you specifically. Doesn't that make sense?
Unfortunately this leviathan that nobly funds NASA also spends trillions dropping bombs on brown people halfway across the planet, funding revolutions to topple governments, and violently suppressing victimless crimes (e.g. drug use, prostitution) that have a very real negative impact on my life and the lives of others I have no qualms with.
If we could decide which systems to voluntarily contribute to, which ones would be funded?