Amid debate over fiscal and tax policy, lawmakers should scrap the idea of capping charitable deductions, Ambassador Earle Mack argues in an essay The Hill published Dec. 3 in its Congress Blog.

“As someone who has been fortunate enough to be able to contribute significantly over the years, I am extremely troubled to see that capping the deduction is one of the ‘compromises’ on the fiscal cliff trading table,” Mack wrote.

Capping charitable deductions would have a “devastating” effect on hospitals, schools and museums, said Mack, who instead recommended measures like hiking taxes 2 percent for top-bracket earners, eliminating bonus depreciation on luxury items and capping mortgage and medical deductions for the most affluent.

A former U.S. Ambassador to Finland and chairman emeritus of the New York State Council on the Arts, Mack is a distinguished Drexel University alumnus, businessman and philanthropist whose humanitarian service included arranging for five emergency-aid flights to Port-au-Prince, Haiti after the 2010 earthquake.