The individual tax deduction is meant to be a temporary bait and switch. A full top line individual deduction of health insurance premium would allow corporations to shift their current contributions to their employees with no net tax consequence (income paid is deductible for the corporation and the premium would be for the individual).

Once that’s in place the next step would be making the general populace aware that the majority of the deductions, at higher tax brackets mind you, are going to the top. That would give the political capital to eliminating the “fat cat insurance deductions” and gradually get us to sanity.