That "a small percentage of top earners pay most of the taxes" is of no consequence.  The stat that is of importance is the percentage of earnings paid as tax by top earners compared to percentage of earnings paid as tax by median earners.  In a progressive system, top earners should pay a higher percentage of earnings as tax, since they receive more benefit from the country, as other posters here point out.  I wish right-wingers would stop repeating this meaningless canard of the total share of all tax paid by top earners.