The National Housing Institute, a housing advocacy group, described the deduction as "a mansion subsidy". Despite that, successive presidents decided MID was essential to the country for reasons other than economic.
"There's a policy of promoting home ownership," said Yongheng Deng, an associate professor of policy planning and development at the University of Southern California.
"The reason for that is all the politicians saw home ownership achieve stability of social harmony, as well as the economy."
The US home ownership rate is almost 70 per cent. According to Dr Deng, the housing market now comprises the single largest form of private investment in the country, worth an estimated $US3 trillion.
The right of business to claim interest payments as a deduction became law in the US in 1913 with the passage of new income tax legislation, although at that point mortgages were all but unknown.
That principle remained with the establishment of new federal mortgage and housing bodies during the Depression to help the struggling US economy regain its footing. It became accepted as an entitlement in the post-war housing and economic boom.
The numeric success has been noted elsewhere, and not just in Australia. China is also interested.
But the President's advisory panel on tax reform? Its recommendation was to scrap the scheme and replace it with tax credits, available to all home owners, with a payment limit of under $US5000, compared with the $US21,000 that could now be claimed on a million-dollar mortgage.
It would apply only to the first home, rather than first and second homes as is now the case.
Nothing further has been heard of this. "It just sort of went away," Dr Deng said.