Agreed maybe I didn't make that clear. Say the top marginal bracket is >250k, and I made 350k. Under a 40% marginal rate I would still get 60k for my extra eff

Agreed maybe I didn't make that clear. Say the top marginal bracket is >250k, and I made 350k. Under a 40% marginal rate I would still get 60k for my extra effort - that is a new car or part of a boat or vacation house, but under 80% I would only get 20k extra for all my trouble. The difference between someone getting paid 250k and 350k is a lot of work, but the 20k you get to show for it is basically nothing - <10% increase in take home money for a >25% increase in work. I could cut my spending by some amount and invested it and had a lot more hours with my family. Numbers aside, the main point I was trying to make is that there is a point at which the marginal tax rate becomes too burdensome, and in my opinion 40% is not it, but 80% is.