Not nitpicky at all – I appreciate the thorough run-down. I was aware of several aspects of this previously, but it is a very useful summary of the situation that you have to deal with in the US.

I wasn’t really trying to hold the US system of local government up as a paradigm of virtue, so much as just to find an example of something that could be contrasted against the UK’s system. Clearly by glossing over the complexity of US local government, this has somewhat hindered achieving that goal.

Based on your breakdown, I think I agree that the UK’s system of local government is clearer and more legible, though the improvements that could be made to the UK still stand. Unitary Authorities in the UK are probably comparable to US consolidated municipality-counties, while two-tier counties are similar to US counties containing multiple municipalities.

It is not obvious to me why state governments in the US are not able to “tidy up” local government in the way that the UK has (even though I think the UK could do more). I can see that in a federation, this should be a state issue rather than a federal one, but it seems like it should be within the states’ power to remedy. I could imagine that it is just politics that makes such things impossible in such a divided political system, but if there were any legal reason that a state government that was so inclined could not do this, I would argue that this would be an undesirable restriction.

Ultimately, I don’t think it changes the argument that I was trying to make, but it probably does make it an even more frustrating issue for the US than it is in the UK.