CWilliams –
Suffice it to say that there are two distinct stances on taxation among Objectivists, as per the old thread you linked to above, and many others. I suggest you read through the whole thing if you have the time.
The tl;dr for me is that Ayn Rand said that there is freewill, which is self-evident, and that cannot be logically squared with people imagining that in a “future world”, everybody will do the right thing and finance the government, or even a meaningful majority of them will. The argument against taxation, for me, is an argument against any realistically plausible government and thus an argument for anarchy, which we all agree is completely irrational. Others think volunteer financing would work just fine, and therefore taxation is immoral. Clearly we’re both making educated guesses on future human behavior.
I spend a lot of time admonishing Objectivists to think about the real world rather than stories and castles in the sky. How exactly would some future you have in mind work? Don’t evade the topic by thinking, “when education is no longer controlled by Socialists everybody will think better and everybody will do the right thing and it will all be okay somehow”. No, think through how it would all really work, in the real world, right now. Do the math and figure out how much it would cost before you dismiss the entire problem as insignificant and not to be worried about.
It’s hard, and takes some time (took me a couple of decades) but it’s the only way to fully understand what you are talking about vs. just staying in line with a mindless narrative and spending all of your time tearing down negatives instead of building up a positives.