this is incorrect -- many large income earners in California pay tons of taxes. And also, many low income earner pay tons of taxes. In a famous experiment, a dozen professional tax prepares were paid to do their best with some (hypothetical) tax situations, and their results were significantly different. IIR the IRS itself was asked to calculate the tax, and it was different again.

Computer programmers in particular might be forgiven for incredulity of these tax systems, but here we are in 2023.