Bush's health insurance tax deduction

President Bush just announced his health insurance tax deduction; $7,500 for single people or $15,000 for families. Sounds impressive. But, wait.

Looking just at how he described it in the speech (press coverage suggests that the actual proposal, which I haven't read, is even worse):

Bush said a family of four with an income of $60,000 will see a tax savings of $4,500 per year. $4,500 / 4 / 12 = $93.75 per person per month. Last time I was paying for health insurance, it was more than three times that expensive, and that was for a healthy 20-something person three years ago.

For the $7,500 single person example, we can assume that the people most desperate for it are probably in the 15% tax bracket (incomes between $7,500 and $30,650). $7,500 * .15 / 12 == $93.75 again. That seems to be the magic number. But note that, due to the $7,500 deduction, the single person's taxable income (after other deductions) needs to be at least $15,000 to get even that.

Those with even lower incomes get less.

Those with incomes above $344,060 ($336,560 + 7500) get $218 per month towards health insurance, almost covering the cost.