When you rely on the lower and middle class to pay the brunt of hte taxes, like the current system, those said classes get angry and bitter and start pushing for lower taxes at all costs. If the tax system is fair, people feel a lot better about it.
This is nothing but a myth. The wealthy already pay most of tax revenue, and they always have.
In the fiscal year 2006, the latest data is available from, the top 1%, aka those making more than $388,806 paid 39.89% of all income tax revenue. The top 10%, those making above $108,904, paid 70.79%. The top 50% paid almost all income tax revenue, at 97.01%. Any suggestion that the 'lower and middle classes' pay the brunt of taxes is delusion at best, and deception at worst.
The wealthy also paid the highest proportion of tax revenue in the highly unequal 1920's. When did the wealthiest pay the least proportion of tax revenue? 1963, near the nadir of the gini index for the 20th century. The actual causation is the reverse of what people intuitively think. Inequality => the wealthy have a disproportionate amount of wealth => the wealthy pay a higher proportion in taxes. If you want the tax burden to be more evenly distributed, enact policies that grow the middle class, so that the middle class has the income to actually pay more taxes.
This graphic says it all:
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