I feel like the intellectual right takes the position that taxes are to solve public goods problems—roads, education, homelessness—not charity. I mostly agree with them here. Why? Anyone can donate their own money to charity.
But everyone in a group of people can reasonably have the preference “everyone donates to charity > no one donates to charity > only I donate to charity”, if each individual values “money to charity” more than they value money held by other people in the group. If so, agreeing to put taxes towards charity could be preferred by everyone. So in some situations, it can be very similar to public goods. See moral public goods for a longer explanation & discussion.
(Of course, among 300 million people, not everyone will agree. But the same is true for normal public goods — not everyone will benefit enough from them to make it worth their taxes.)
This means that you actually have to engage with the details of what the public thinks about various types of charity, to see if it’s more of a “public goods” type situation or if people would prefer to not give any money to charity. The case of foreign aid is kind of confusing. Based on my memory, and also what GPT-5 says:
Most Americans think the US should reduce spending on foreign aid
But they also vastly overestimate foreign aid spending, believing it’s like 20%+ of the budget
If asked for specific numbers on how much foreign aid the US should spend, they say numbers in between the true foreign aid (~1%) and their current impression of what foreign aid is
GPT-5 did also cite one study where Americans were informed that the US only spends like ~1% and then asked if they should spend more or less — and then majority think the US should spend a similar amount or more rather than reduce spending on foreign aid. (34 reduce / 37 same / 28 increase.) [1]
So overall I think it’s very reasonable for the US to spend money on foreign aid, and very reasonable for people to vote on candidates based on whether they match their own position on how much foreign aid there should be.
But everyone in a group of people can reasonably have the preference “everyone donates to charity > no one donates to charity > only I donate to charity”, if each individual values “money to charity” more than they value money held by other people in the group. If so, agreeing to put taxes towards charity could be preferred by everyone. So in some situations, it can be very similar to public goods. See moral public goods for a longer explanation & discussion.
(Of course, among 300 million people, not everyone will agree. But the same is true for normal public goods — not everyone will benefit enough from them to make it worth their taxes.)
This means that you actually have to engage with the details of what the public thinks about various types of charity, to see if it’s more of a “public goods” type situation or if people would prefer to not give any money to charity. The case of foreign aid is kind of confusing. Based on my memory, and also what GPT-5 says:
Most Americans think the US should reduce spending on foreign aid
But they also vastly overestimate foreign aid spending, believing it’s like 20%+ of the budget
If asked for specific numbers on how much foreign aid the US should spend, they say numbers in between the true foreign aid (~1%) and their current impression of what foreign aid is
GPT-5 did also cite one study where Americans were informed that the US only spends like ~1% and then asked if they should spend more or less — and then majority think the US should spend a similar amount or more rather than reduce spending on foreign aid. (34 reduce / 37 same / 28 increase.) [1]
So overall I think it’s very reasonable for the US to spend money on foreign aid, and very reasonable for people to vote on candidates based on whether they match their own position on how much foreign aid there should be.
I did check that the question and the numbers checked out, but I didn’t otherwise vet that the study was reasonable.