Maggie's Farm

Should We End the Tax Deduction for Charitable Donations?

Reading between the lines of the article, one guy says that people will still give anyway, even if there is no deduction. The other one seems to be actively involved in soliciting big donations and knows that the presence of the deduction is one of the arguments which helps her make the "sale".

First guy says the deduction benefits mostly high-earners who don't need it. She says, no, the benefit goes to the people getting services from the charities supported.

I've seen lots of noise about this one on the more left-leaning fora that I frequent. One of the key bits of information that we don't have in our link is that there is a vocal bunch who hate-hate-hate the charitable deduction because such a large proportion of the qualifying donations are given to churches and faith-based aid organizations.
The next largest proportion goes to big cultural institutions, such as libraries, art museums, ballet, opera, PBS - and here the opposition fractures into two groups:
One group claims that this isn't charity, because it is just rich people using moneys deprived from the treasury to do things that benefit themselves, but don't help the nation at large. (Taking money out of social programs so that you can watch "Great Performances" on TV...)
The other group would prefer that the big cultural institutions were dependent directly upon the government for their funding anyway, like they are in Europe. They won't say it, but this is because donors tend to give to things that are both popular and support our cultural heritage, whereas government money can be controlled by people who will direct the funds to artists and organizations with the right politics.