As they should. That's what happens when you have a progressive tax structure. Do you think we should we shift some of that tax burden onto people who make less than $25k per year?
If I eat a steak, the restaurant doesn't come to me and say "Hey, you make 10% more than the guy two tables down, so you'll pay 10% more for your steak".
Why did this sliding rule ever get enacted for taxation? If you use something, you pay for it at the established price.
Taxation is a generally accepted necessary evil way to fund projects and services for the common good. A progressive tax policy recognises that a person with a high income can bear a greater burden; taxing a minimum wage earner 30% of their income would have a much higher proportional effect on quality of life that someone earning, say, 200k. We seem to accept progressive taxation as fair, in the sense that it causes no more inconvenience to low earners than high earners.
The comparison with a private commercial service is flawed, in the sense that engagement with it is an entirely personal choice.
That's exactly what a lot of people are up in arms about, they get taxed hugely but get no real say in how the money is spent. Sure they get a vote, but if your candidate loses it's not as though you're exempt from paying taxes.
In some way these people are right; if they choose to engage in commerce they aren't being forced to do anything and as such "whatever the market will bear" is a good metric.
Taxes aren't about "whatever the market will bear" though because you don't have a choice to not consume and therefore not pay.
In other words, the state, by upholding the rule of law (particularly property law), is providing the ultra wealthy with a service of far greater value than that which it provides those with lower wealth/income.
Those who are high income in California are generally not wealthy (as opposed to everyone's favorite high income poster boy - the NY hedge fund manager), but are subjects to windfall effect - a few years of work at below market wages in hopes for a giant payback (royalties in Hollywood, stock options of a successful tech startup in the Valley).
It bothers me a bit though. I'd actually rather earn less and things be more affordable. The homeless situation in the city I moved to is truly insane and unsustainable. Tech companies drive up prices. I have a friend who lives in a neighbourhood where all the homes were around $100k when she was a kid; and now the same homes can go anywhere from $500k to nearly a million!
You see some of the average working class taking those big payouts and moving further from the city (and potentially driving more; increasing the traffic problem).
I'd rather earn less, my housing be more affordable and things be more equal for everyone. Supply and demand for housing really drive these crazy swings in gentrification.
Or is it just a commodity that we all utilize and is payed for with a flat rate, regardless of the value/un-value is provides?
Fyi, those sentences in your reasoning are already handled by a hypothetical flat tax percentage. It's the percentage that handles your cases as you stated them. For example, if a flat 15% tax was applied for everyone, the billionaire earning $30 million pays $4500000 in taxes, while the Walmart earning $20k pays $3000.
Mathematically, 4500000 is greater than 3000. In that case, the billionaire has paid more taxes which satisfies your reasoning.
On the other hand, the previous posters were emphasizing "progressive" taxes. That means that the percentages themselves are increased as income increases. Your rationale isn't specific to that. Probably the most common math rationale for progressive taxation is the concept of marginal utility of money[1]. In other words, a billionaire's $1 million of money made between $29 million and $30 million is less significant to him and therefore, can be taxed at a more "progressive" tax rate of 40% instead of 15%. On the other hand, the Walmart employees $1000 from $3000 to $4000 pays for food and rent and is not discretionary play money.
In any case, what I said wouldn't be covered under a flat tax percentage unless that flat tax percentage were on wealth, not income. A person making approximately 20k or less currently pays no income tax, which makes sense, because there's virtually no way they can accumulate any wealth at that income. On the other hand, as you move up each income tier, the amount of wealth you can accumulate goes up progressively. So a progressive tax is a close enough approximation to a flat tax on wealth, which is what I'm arguing makes the most sense.
If you upped the tax to $10k, you'd still only be talking about $2tn, but you'd have huge swathes of the country forced into poverty as they'd be unable to pay it.
You'd need immense corporation taxes in order to make up the shortfall. Currently US business taxes make around 8% of the budget, compared to 36% for income tax. A flat dollar tax is nuts. The rich make their money from the labour of many, many people. They may only personally use the roads the same as others, but the thousands of their employees that need to drive to work need it a thousand times more. Without that, the rich would have no business. Ditto with healthcare. You need your workers healthy and they can't afford healthcare, you pay for it or you soon won't have many workers. $10k does not pay for much healthcare. Blindness to the social costs that are picked up by the government, does not mean that they don't exist.
The rich can pay a bit more and still be rich. They need to pay a bit more or they won't be rich for long, their workers and customers won't exist anymore.