I gleened it from conservative economist Kevin Phillips' book Wealth & Democracy. I assume it's bog standard economic world building. Nothing I've read since has contradicted Phillips. (I'm noob, not some kind of economist. Though I did get to chat with Phillips one time and I felt like I understood his answers.)
What mental model do you prefer?
Or maybe you object to the implications ("logic") of this model. That notions like property, wealth, and government are social constructs. Just shared fictions which hopefully make the world a little bit more predictable (legible), without too much extra effort, so we can all muddle thru our daily lives.
I think the Homestead Act is a good example for explaining my objection.
First of all, I believe the government is the agent and servant of the people, not the other way around. Any government land is also owned by the people because the people own the government. The Homestead Act was a simple way of Distributing this land to to be held directly by the people instead of managing it on their behalf.
When considering the giving away of land, the government loses property. What the government gains is the hope or chance that people will do something productive with it. Even if those people only benefit themselves and retain the profits, they are increasing the economy and total wealth/value of the country. This is the repayment, and those individuals dont "owe" the government anything.
What I especially object to is the idea of retrospectively applied debt, often long after the fact.
You see this a lot in discussion of government grants for science and tech research.
The government creates and awards research grants to encourage development because the public would be better off if the medicine or whatever exists opposed to not exist, even if it is being sold for a profit.
However, when something does get invented and sold, some people then think the public is owed a debt. This isn't true. The government provided funding because it wanted the thing to exist. Once it exists, the government's objective and any obligation has already been met.
By analogy, imagine two neighbors. Neighbor A pays for the other (Neighbor B) to paint their house out of self interest, because it will make the neighborhood look better and raise their own property value. The neighbor B has fulfilled their obligation and any debt by painting the house. It is both logically and morally bankrupt for Neighbor A to come back at a later day and claim the other is in their debt, after they already got what they initially wanted and bargained for.
This comes back to the idea of the government as the "source" of all wealth, deserving repayment.
Like I said before, the government is important, and even essential for economic development.
Being essential is different than being the "source" or deserving repayment. A government built road is essential for me to get to work, however that doesn't mean the government is the source of all the work I did, or entitled to a share of my salary, provided I already paid my share for the road.
The story's similar for ranching, mining, power, telecommunications, etc, etc.
TLDR: The government is the source of all wealth.
Which is terrific. So long as the government's ongoing investments are repaid in kind.