Simply handing drug dealers and corrupt politicians a boatload of money isn't likely to do much of anything - he'd be bankrupt in a year and the city worse off than when he started. That's why the Harvey Dent arc was so crucial: Batman can only do so much in the shadows, but what the city really NEEDED was a hero who could operate in the light of day (though he still needed support from the shadows).

Ofc the real answer is that the premise of the franchise is based on Batman punching people, as in physically, so his goal isn't even saving the city so much as making satisfying wham bam pow sounds.

More "political" franchises are fewer and further between, which is why Star Wars and to a lesser degree Trek (in this regard) were so popular. Both involved a radical, violent and bloody overthrow of the corrupt forces (Trek having been in the past but in Wars it happening "live" and being the central feature).

IIRC, one of the films noted that his parents had tried to fund serious reform in Gotham (I think the newest film, with Robert Pattinson?), and that corruption and crime siphoned off and diverted all the money away from the causes they were trying to support. I'm not sure if that's cannon or not.

Looking at a number of cities in the US that have historically had a serious problem with public corruption, it's not really an either/or approach; you need to adequately fund public works, but you also need to fight the crime and corruption that tries to take all the public money away from the public.

Yeah, the refusal to kill is the worst part about Batman. Like, it's cool that you have a moral code or whatever, but when you keep putting mass murderers like the Joker in a prison you know he's gonna escape from, you should probably think about your life choices. You kind of get why Jason Todd went a little nuts when Batman didn't kill the Joker after he brutally murdered a child that Batman dressed up and put in his way. Holy shit, just shoot the guy in the fuckin face, you know?