Tag Archives: Tax Vp

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.

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?

As Rick Kelo knows, one of the best things about driving cross-country – or simply meandering the byways of America – is finding those delightful little restaurants tucked into out-of-the way spots, or found unexpectedly in otherwise grim strip malls.

The United States is a melting pot of languages, cultures, ethnicities, traditions, and – most importantly – food. From the French and Spanish influence that created the magnificent cuisine of New Orleans, to the gut-bursting hot dogs and deep-dish pizza in Chicago, to the deli food (particularly bagels) of New York City, to the Tex-Mex food of the southwestern United States, this country is a gourmet’s delight. A trip around the United States gives the traveler the opportunity to sample various regional cuisines, creating a thoroughly unique experience.

The website Roadfood has many faithful, hungry, appreciative members, and many reviews of restaurants across the United States (and in Alaska and Hawaii). Restaurants can be searched by type of food and by state (and by city within each state). Reviews are consistently well-written, and are accompanied by mouth-watering photographs of the restaurant’s signature dish (or dishes). Some of the photographs are staggering – a pastrami sandwich, for example, piled so high with meat that no human mouth could possibly take a bite out of it. A pizza the size of a truck tire. An enormous, gooey sundae dripping with sweet toppings. An ice-cream cone so big that it runs the risk of toppling over.

Roadfood also features driving tours. This section of the site gives advice to travelers to various areas of the country. One tour, covering twenty-eight miles, is titled “Portland, Oregon in a day”. It covers no less than seven eating establishments. For more adventurous diners, there is a tour that starts in Seattle and travels east. It covers one hundred and twenty miles and encompasses two cafes, a bakery, a coffee house, and a genuine drive-in diner. Visitors to Pittsburgh can visit four fine eateries, one (Primanti Brothers) with the truly enormous sandwiches mentioned above. This sandwich shop features a pastrami and egg sandwich that includes a tomato, cole slaw, and a mountain of French fries – all tucked skillfully between two thick slices of bread. This sandwich shop is not a place for the culinarily timid. All the sandwiches come on large pieces of bread, and most feature French fries as a key ingredient, whether the sandwich is pastrami, roast beef, or kolbassi.

There is an old saying: it is impossible to be sure of anything except death and taxes. While death might seem like the more daunting of the two, it simply marks the end of life. Taxes, on the other hand, are life. We live with taxes every day of our lives, or at least whenever we are paid. Taxation tends to be one of the hottest topics in the political sphere and our recent election is a prime example of that fact. The concept of taxes is double-edged sword. Of course, most mature adults either agree with the taxes placed on their income, or they have at least grown numb to the missing percent of their paycheck. It is understandable that the country taxes us in order to maintain many of the public services that we take advantage of every day. Still, most people groan at the thought of taxes because of the simple fact that they do not get to access some of the spending power that they worked so hard for.

For business owners, the topic of taxes becomes even more complicated. In a recent article published on Rick Kelo’s blog, the economist and financial expert wrote about tax loopholes and the way that business owners deal with the day-to-day struggles of their professional finances. In his article, he explains how Donald Trump, either a genius or madman, was able to avoid paying taxes for so many years, especially in light of the astoundingly large salary he claimed to be making. In short, he was able to take advantage of a tax loophole called net operating loss. As Rick Kelo says in his article “net operating loss is essentially when one’s losses and deductions combined exceed one’s income”. In the real estate industry, developers take advantage of this because they typically have to borrow huge amounts of money before they see a profit. This lets them use their net operating loss for the next 20 years and essentially “cheat” the tax system.

Tax professionals such as Rick Kelo are some of the only individuals aware of these loopholes. However, rather than exploiting their knowledge of the United States tax systems, these professionals use their expertise to share this knowledge with the wider public, making people aware of how some of their own are taking advantage of the country. For Rick Kelo, understanding the complexities of the economy is a means of fixing the economy, not taking advantage of it. We can only hope that the new President-elect shares this point of view as well.

For today’s thinkers, there is no greater place than the internet. The rise of the digital technology era has enabled people to exchange information, ideas, and news almost instantaneously from nearly any location on the planet. This free flowing information has generate new perspectives and inspired a generation of thinkers to tap into the World Wide Web in order to access the largest possible audience. Unfortunately, not enough people have taken to the internet as a means of communicating their perspectives and ideas. Of course, the millennial generation has largely championed communication online, but luckily they are not the only ones logging on and sharing their thoughts. There are politicians, celebrities, economists, scientists, authors, and artists who have realized that the internet is a powerful tool for educating people around the world and promoting causes that they believe are important.

For Rick Kelo, using online presence as social service was the primary motivation for his personal blog. As a financial expert and executive recruiter with TaxScout, one of the nation’s largest professional placement services in the country, Rick Kelo’s blog is a trusted source of information and an interesting perspective of the state of the United States Economy. He has written articles about everything from the definition, causes, and implications of economic “bubbles” to tax loopholes and even an article entitled “Socialism and Star Wars”, in which he uses the Empire from the Star Wars franchise to highlight important aspects of socialist systems.

In a recent article posted on his website titled, “Why More People Don’t Understand Basic Economics”, he explained the flawed education system in the United States and how the majority of students graduate with only the barest working knowledge of our nation’s economic structure. Not only does he post interesting articles on his personal website, but he has also diversified his online presence across multiple blogging and social media platforms. This has enabled him to reach a vast amount of people, specifically within the millennial demographic that needs the most education about these important topics. A lot of really brilliant people feel that they do not need or cannot use the internet as a platform for sharing their opinions with the world. This is a huge problem because society is missing out on the opportunity to learn and grow from the shared experiences of such individuals. It is important that people of all ages and backgrounds realize that they can, and possibly should, have their voices heard on the web.

For more information on Rick Kelo, the outspoken blogger questioning the modern age, visit his website or the various social media outlets that he is currently using.