High priority data and low priority digital data are transmitted as primary and secondary data in hierarchically modulated, orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) from an earth-orbiting satellite. To enable the transmitter amplifier to be operated with less back-off from saturation without clipping, the low priority OFDM symbols have fewer samples than the high priority OFDM symbols, and the high priority samples on which the low priority samples are superimposed are selected according to a first deterministic rule using sample power comparisons of the high priority samples to concentrate the low priority samples on those high priority samples having lower (optimally, the lowest) sample power. The low priority samples are distributed on the selected high priority samples according to a second deterministic rule relating the original low priority sample order to the original high priority sample order.