Rick Kelo speaks on EPA Super-Fund Sites

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This article lists the 10 worst EPA super-fund sites of all time.  When we consider the problem of pollution and other, what economists call, neighborhood effects most people only picture the polluter.  Maybe a big company pumping toxic fumes out of a smoke stack or dumping industrial waste into a river.  Rick Kelo points out though that we also need to look at why this pollution happened in the first place.

Rick keloRick Kelo noticed a trend hidden in the list of 10 worst super-fund list and asked why every single item on that list has to do with water or air pollution?  An aspect of pollution we almost never consider.  “In America where are the problematic instances of pollution? It is not mainly on land, where there are strict private property rights. The problematic issues of pollution occur predominantly (to the point of almost exclusively) in the air & water, which are government owned and where private property rights are outlawed,” says Kelo.  “The reason is what’s called Tragedy of the Commons,” he continues.

Under a regime of incredibly strict property rights pollution could not happen, and certainly not to tne extent of the sites we see here. The reason it happens, as Richard Kelo points out, is precisely because we have your system of regulations that shift the burden of acting as an owner onto the government.

Rick Kelo on Forms vs. Functions of Government

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Rick Kelo is a Classic Liberal who, with an educational background in Economics from the prestigious US Military Academy at West Point, focuses on economic questions.  One of those questions is does the form of a government really matter, or does its function matter?  For instance is only a totalitarian regime dictatorial, or is it possible for a Democracy to be dictatorial too?

Americans have long believed their freedoms were safe because of the form of their government: a republic.  Most Americans are convinced that only dictatorships, like the one in Syria, can be autocratic but not a representative democracy where the voter decides.

When Rick Kelo considered that question he raised a distinction that almost everyone has overlooked.  We usually distinguish between the form of government but not the function.  What should matter to us is the extent the individual is free or oppressed, not the form of that oppression.  Is oppression from a powerful monarch any different than oppression from a powerful parliament?  As Richard Kelo points out, if the State functions by holding extensive power, and the citizen holds very little power over their own actions, then that government is tyrannical whether its form is a dictatorship or a republic.

How often do we consider what ultimately comprises a representative government: majority vote wins, but disregard the other half of what comprises a representative government: individual rights.  One example of this is the popular trope on the far political left of “Democratic Socialism.”  The savvy Socialist knows he must distance himself from dictatorial forms of government since Socialist dictators mass murdered 150,000,000 people last century.  So, the savvy Socialist aims to claim moral goodness as proved by getting a 51% vote to legitimize their immorality.

Of course, if we consider the powerful function of such a government – not its form of being democratically elected – then we see that even if you get the representative government Socialism cannot exist without oppressing the individual rights.

Even Hitler was elected.  Elections are no guarantee of freedom.

Rick Kelo

Rick Kelo

Rick Kelo speaks on Life under Capitalism

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Capitalism has become a very unpopular word in America, especially among America’s college age youth.  To its critics the term “capitalism” conjures up images of sweat shops and grifty merchants peddling misrepresenting the quality of faulty goods they peddle.

However, some voices run contrary to popular sentiment.  One of them is Rick Kelo, a graduate of West Point and a veteran tax recruiter in Chicago.  Rick draws on his prior background as an economist and points out that Capitalism outlaws nothing except theft.  It organizes large groups of people under a system of peaceful and voluntary cooperation.  Nothing is forced.

Capitalism says it is a useful function of government to prevent plunder and theft. To that end the only social institutions necessary to promote capitalism are:

  1. A military to deal with foreign aggression against private property.
  2. A police force / court system to deal with domestic aggression against private property.

Isn’t it curious that in capitalist nations even Socialism is not outlawed?!  There’s a socialist party in America today. There have been many notorious failed communes in America.  There are worker-owned co-ops.  Every single thing Socialists pretend to advocate as a “solution” to the ills of Capitalism already exist in capitalist economies.  Of course, that’s because Socialists may claim they advocate those things, but their economic alternative to Capitalism is actually collectivist plunder & a retrograde movement toward the type of social structure proper to militancy.

Richard A KeloRick Kelo challenges us to compare that to the coercive, militant, centrally planned society Socialists advocate to the peaceful, voluntary society based on Capitalism.  Where’s the capitalist party in North Korea?  In the Socialist’s co-op only society every other form of organization except co-ops are dealt with by violence.  All the normal private ownership of companies must be seized and redistribute according to the preferences of the Socialist leader, who initiates violence against the legitimate owners of that private property.  New companies are forcibly prevented from forming in the first place by use of aggression from the badge & the gun to threaten those workers wishing to flee government dictated co-ops and start their own business.

Notice how many Americans are fleeing to Venezuela? Or how many South Koreans are trying to escape the horrors of capitalism for North Korea?  Exactly.

Rick Kelo’s Quick Thought on the Minimum Wage

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As someone who has vigorously advocated peaceful & voluntary economic cooperation as superior to coercive, State-mandates it comes as no surprise that Richard Kelo has an opinion on the minimum wage.

People think minimum wage will raise the living standards of the most vulnerable workers.  It will, slightly.  But, as Rick Kelo points out often on Twitter, only for those who don’t become unemployed by it.   In his formal education as an economist before becoming a tax recruiter, Rick discovered that minimum wages are not truly a wage increase at all.  They are actually a wage transfer.  Those workers who are forced out of work have their wage transferred to those minimum wage workers who are fortunate enough to keep their job under the new, higher, minimum wage.

If our real belief is that we want to help the most vulnerable, then we should oppose increasing these arbitrary wage laws by remembering how much harm they do to the living standards of the newly unemployed they create.

Rick Kelo & James Galbraith after sparring on economics

The Effect of Trump on Small Business and Economy

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What impacts are Trump’s economic reforms expected to cause?    

Rick Kelo, a resident of Kansas has seen various changes and reform in the American economy over the years. From the various reform policies that have been introduced by Obama’s administration and how Trump has proposed to deal with the persistent issues, there is a lot happening on the current economic horizon.

The major question right now is how Trump stands to affect the economy and what that means for various types of businesses. In the following paragraphs, Trump’s potential impact on the economy in general and small businesses in particular has been discussed.cropped-news.png

When it comes to Kansas, Rick Arthur Kelo says that things don’t look so good from the economic angle, at least at the moment. About a month back, Stephen Mnuchin and Gary Cohn, two of Trump’s important economic allies revealed the basic structure of the much-awaited tax plan. These reforms have been ambitiously called the biggest tax cuts in all of history. These are supposed to slash taxes paid by businesses and make the entire tax filing and return process easier for everyone.

Mnuchin and Gary claimed that these new taxes will stimulate further economic growth where everyone will pay for themselves. However, some members from the Kansas administration like Duane Goossen have expressed their concern at the similarities between this economic plan and the one for which Kansas reached this delirious state in the first place.

Arthur Laffer, an expert on supply-side economics since the time of Raegan is the “economic spirit” behind Trump’s economic plan. Laffer is also one of the architects behind the tax plan proposed by Kansas Governor Sam Brownback. The former member of the economic policy advisory board that assisted Reagan is widely known for the Laffer curve.

In simple words, this is derived from a theory which states that economic activity is directly tied to taxation. If the taxes are lowered, up to a certain point, it will mean more revenue. However, tax reforms based on this tax slashing theory is what is said to have brought Kansas where it is in the first place.

Therefore, while some business owners are positive about the coming change and believe that it will bring benefits for the business, there is no lack of administrators who feel that the entire country will soon be affected exactly how Kansas was. The state has been struggling to balance its books, and the tax breaks have been blamed for the situation.

Rick Kelo- Internet Information Communities

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The Internet Has Provided the Perfect Platform for Intellectual Minds to Come Together and Provide Support for Those Looking For Answers

What is an internet information community? In short, it is a community of online users dedicated to helping each other find information however pertinent or trivial, and use their skills and education to help others. There is perhaps no greater example of this than the famous question and answers forum Quora. Quora allows users to create profiles of themselves also listing their education and qualifications. Then, when questions are posted on the site, regarding literature, economics, philosophy or sport for example, experts in the field can come back with answers. It is, in some ways, like the intellectual version of Yahoo Answers.Richard Arthur Kelo

Rick Kelo is one such thinker who has taken to the forum to offer his advise and wisdom to members of the community. Today, Rick Kelo works as a tax consultant in a large American firm. His interest and studies in economics, and political history, make him an authoritative voice on such matters, where he has answered questions ranging from labor economics to socialism. For Rick Kelo, forums like Quora are important in helping to disseminate unbiased, neutral and professional ideas and opinion.

A good example of this is a recent question, which asked why there was so much wealth disparity say, between a janitor in America and a Janitor in a third World Country. Rick Kelo’s answer was ”There’s more accumulated capital per worker in the American economy (where the U.S. janitor works) than in Nigeria’s economy (where the Nigerian janitor works). This is also the same reason why the American janitor of 2016 earns a higher wage than the American janitor of 1950 even though they’re no more productive.”

An answer like this is typical of Rick Kelo’s style- succinct, to-the-point and informative. He also tackled another pressing question, about the possible effects of reducing corporate tax rates, ”The answer to your question must be considered along three lines. The first line is the impact to the individual firm that now has a lower tax burden. The second line is the impact to the overall US economy, by which is meant the 60% of GDP comprised from the private sector. The third line is the impact on the US federal government in terms of tax receipts and the programs funded by those tax revenues.” For Rick Kelo, using his education to make important intellectual contributions to forums such as Quora, is an important duty of an educated American citizen.

Rick Kelo – What Is Happening With the Estate Tax?

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The Current Estate Tax Rules

Rick Kelo notes that the US Congress is considering a wide range of tax reform proposals currently. One of the many reform proposals deals with the US Estate Tax and its possible repeal. As per statistics, the Estate Tax in its current form has an impact on only 0.2% of all US estates.

According to the current legislation in place, an American citizen gets to enjoy a life-time exclusion amount of $5.5 at the moment. As a result, a married couple can leave behind $11 to their family and/or friends without the need for any Estate Tax. Of course, both of them need to be American citizens.

The effect of Estate Tax has been considered by Rick Kelo. As per the current law, any property that has been passed at death will get a step-up in terms of tax for determining the future capital gains that occur when the property has been sold.Rick Kelo

Illustrating the Effect

Consider an asset that has been purchased for $1,000. When this property is sold for $2,000, the taxpayer will have enjoyed a capital gain of $1,000. Now, if this asset was instead passed after the death of the taxpayer, the recipient’s tax basis will be increased to match the asset’s value at the date of the decedent’s death.

Continuing with the example, the first taxpayer will have bought the asset at $1,000. At his or her death, consider the value of the asset to be $1,500. The taxpayer who inherits the asset ends up selling the asset for $2,000. Now, for this taxpayer, the tax basis was increased to $1,500. As a result his or her capital gain after the sale is just $500.

 What Does the Repeal Bring?

The repeal of the estate tax can affect this transaction. Its repeal may actually cause the step up in the tax basis to be removed as well. Instead, it might be replaced by the carry over basis. In the case of the previous example, the taxpayer inheriting the asset will have a tax basis of $1,000 which was the original basis. As a result, the sale of the asset at $2,000 will bring a profit of $1,000.

While possibly welcome, Rick Kelo believes that repealing the Estate Tax might not actually be that much of a benefit. In fact, there is a chance that the repeal will lead to an increase in the taxes that must be paid than what is currently required.

Rick Kelo – Information, Democracy, and Social Media

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Where can we turn in our modern world for accurate, up to date, and interest information about what is happening in the world? There has been a dramatic shift recently in the way that information is spread throughout the public. Previously, people heard information through word of mouth, through reading a local or national newspaper, or maybe listening to the radio. But with the invention of modern technology, media has taken to social networking sites and the World Wide Web in general, using the power of digital communication to bring information to people around the world almost instantaneously. At the same time, the speed that information can now be shared around the world has meant that a lot of what we see and read online is not entirely accurate. Without a buffer of time, individuals (and more importantly, amateurs) are able to post anything they want about the world online.

If you are looking for interesting and up to date information on the state of our country’s political and economic atmosphere, turn to the articles on Rick Kelo’s blog Ceteris Paribus: “Economics from the Austrian and Monetarist Traditions”, “Political Philosophy from the Classic Liberal Tradition”, and  “Socialism and Star Wars”. Rick Kelo is a professional tax consultant, expert in economics, and active plotter in the political sphere of the United States. Countless individuals have turned to his published articles for interesting reads that promise to engage people while also delivering them hard hitting information about economics and political theory. cropped-news.png

He has also used social media and the digital world as his primary means of communicating. This has had a significant impact on the response to his writings. Many millennials, and in fact more than 60% of all people in the United States, get their news exclusively from social media. Because of this, it is crucial that thought-leaders and those who care about the economy take to the web as a battleground for sharing information. By getting information out there to the majority of people, Rick Kelo and other economists like him are making sure that our country is more informed, even if it is in a relatively small way.

Rick Kelo (on MSNBC) continues to publish his thoughts and ideas online, despite his demanding day job, because he believes strongly in the need for more people to have informed opinions about the state of the American economy and political situation. Only with a fully educated population can we expect to remain one of the world’s main democratic powers.

Rick Kelo And Staff Retention

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Rick Kelo, CEO of Chicago-based recruiting firm, TaxScout Inc., is concerned by the number of employee resignitions that have been conclusively linked with dissatisfaction with their manager or boss. True, there has always been a suspicion that ‘people leave the boss, not the company,’ but until now there has been scant analysis to back up the theory. That has now changed. Recent research has definitively proven that more than half of all employees who resign from their positions do so because of problems with their boss. And it is now clear that urgent remedial action is required to stem the flow of work departures.Rick Kelo

The problem, as Rick Kelo perceives it, is that there is far too much importance placed on intelligence and not nearly enough on emotional response. EQ requires self-awareness. Recognizing that as a manager you are the cause of the problem helps concentrate the mind wonderfully. And as the research makes clear, there are some extremely simple measures that any can adopt to improve the overall situation in the company. Firstly, for example, is the time-honored advice of giving credit where credit is due. Data shows that that when people were asked to describe their worst boss, 33 percent never gave any praise, while 28 percent rarely gave encouragement or recognition for tasks accomplished.

As Rick Kelo emphasizes, that accounts for around 55 percent of all employees who state that their worst boss never gave any form of praise. Look at it another way: that is 55 percent of employees who left  companies because their boss simply did not understand the importance of motivation. And this is further corroborated by an astonishing 60 percent, who stated that the important part of being a manager was to give appropriate praise and make the workforce feel appreciated.

For Rick Kelo, this is an easy, zero-cost fix. The ability to empathize with the workforce should be a mandatory managerial requirement; Forget the gilt-edged MBAs and diplomas lining the walls of the office – try and put yourself in the shoes of others, try to feel as they do about situations. By so doing, we will learn the importance of praise. Do not expect your ‘team’ to go over and beyond their stipulated responsibilities. With no encouragement, there is more chance them scheming behind your back rather than exercising their own intelligence on getting the work completed to the best of their capabilities. Which is surely why they were hired in the first place?

Rick Kelo & The Rules of Capitalism

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Rick Kelo is a West Point graduate who studied economics and finance at the under-grad and graduate levels before becoming a tax recruiter at TaxScout, Inc.  When Rick considers what makes an economy capitalist it is very straight-forward to him.

The rules of capitalism are simple, says Rick Kelo:

  1. Everything voluntary, nothing forced.
  2. Serve your fellow man the best way possible – the entrepreneur’s creed.
  3. Abundance mindset: Upon seeing a rich man the socialist says: “No man should have so much!” The capitalist says: “All men should have so much.”

Chicago tax recrutier Rick Kelo

When asked what’s the opposite Richard Kelo considers it the Socialist’s Creed of “I know what’s best for you, but I’m not content to merely convince you of my rightness; I’d rather force you to adopt my ways.”