It still opens the door to higher education level to more people, it's easier to go to university if you end up paying for it with your taxes over your lifetime instead of having to pay tens of thousands a couple of years in a row.

At my salary (60k/year) I pay 8k to my province in taxes every year (students don't have to pay taxes by the way), 1.7k goes to education and even the best university costs about 1.5k/session, compare that to the US:

http://www.topuniversities.com/student-info/student-finance/how-much-does-it-cost-study-us

So I can go to the best university around for 1/10th the cost of the same type of education I would receive in the US! Let's do some maths...

B.A. at a top university over here is three years for 3k/year so 9k

B.A. in the US in a top university is 4 years at 30k/year so 120k

120k-9k is 111k, that's the difference in cost for a B.A., after that I'm paying 1.7k for education every year, let's do as if it was only paying for universities (even if it's paying for all levels of education):

111k/1.7k=65... After 68 years of paying for education I'll have paid to the system the same amount as it would have cost me to study in the USA!

Yeah, I'll continue paying my taxes thanks.