There's an interesting conceptual tension in your post:

High performers like to believe that they're entitled to the vast majority of the country's income because they're responsible for the vast majority of the wealth creation. Thus they see high taxes as "punishment" for success. But if that's true, why does it matter if say the bottom 40% of income earners just stop working. They account for only about 10% of the nations income, and presumably if the market compensates people fairly production would decrease by only 10% or less if these people stopped working.