No matter what tax policy the government has, some people will do particularly badly and others particularly well. (It is obviously not feasible to investigate

No matter what tax policy the government has, some people will do particularly badly and others particularly well. (It is obviously not feasible to investigate every single taxpayer's financial situation.) Of course it will sometimes happen that someone with a large salary is badly hurt by paying $X extra taxes. It will also sometimes happen that someone with a smaller salary is badly hurt by paying $X extra taxes. And the point is that the latter will happen much more often than the former. Taxing the rich (for whatever definition of "rich") more doesn't mean believing that all rich people can easily afford to pay the extra, any more than not taxing the rich more means believing that all not-rich people can easily afford to pay the higher taxes they'll have to pay if the rich aren't taxed more. It just means believing that overall the population is better off that way. (And yes, of course, tax+redistribute until equality is never actually going to happen, and a good thing too.)