Bluster out of washington. Yep, thats what investors should expect short term. Maybe until january 1st. Should they also expect a rally any time soon . According to ryan dieterich, rally could most definitely be headed our way. He joins us now to explain along with Peter Anderson from Congress Asset management company. Bill mcvail from turner Investment Partners and our very own rick santelli. Peter, i have to begin with you. With a name like Congress Asset management, is Congress Going to come through for your assets . Well, i wish i had an inside scoop on that, but unfortunately, were also left to speculate at this point. But i will say this. Whats incredible about this market is the way the market moved up today, its an instant Polling Network that the government can use, actually, to kind of float trial balloons to us and get a sense of what we think of their proposed actions. Peter, that is so charming. You assume this government cares what you think. Well, i like to think that. I do think that they are paying attention to the markets, even though they say they dont. It is a great Feedback Mechanism for them. I think that by january 1st well have so much more clarity that even the thought of having that kind of clarity will definitely push the markets in a positive direction. Rick santelli, does this white house care about what the markets think, do you think . No, i dont think so. If the market had 800 or 900point moves, maybe theyd care more. Just to give you an example, this isnt really related, but the volcker rule was supposed to be done by the end of this year. Theyre going to delay it now until the end of the next quarter. In two weeks, were going to celebrate the second anniversary of the passing of dodd frank. They cant even get one aspect of a bill passed two years ago and we think were going to delve into any type of serious reform on the tax or entitlement side or even a framework by christmas. Oh, yeah. I guess im the tooth fairy. Bill, so what do you do here with no fiscal cliff deal yet, with whispers of possibly the fed stimulating the economy even further, and with Economic Data pouring in almost daily that suggests were still sputtering along . Well, i tend to think 2013s going to be a great year. Im not just looking at housing and employment. Im looking at the architectural building index. Theres stuff in the draw room. Theyre ready to bid out this winter and break ground in the spring. The republicans know that. The democrats know that. I would agree with rick. Right now its hard to imagine they can come up with something. We know they can. We know the democrats can say, okay, well give you something on means testing entitlements and well move the Social Security age up. Republicans will say, well get rid of second mortgage deductions. They can do it. I dont think they really want to do it yet. So we just sit here sort of up 100, down 100. You know, just stand on the sidelines and wait until they figure it out. Ryan, how are you allocating capital as we watch these gyrations on a daily basis because of comments out of capitol hill . The bottom line, were still bullish. We think we can have a good year and rally. There are two reasons. Overall sentiment. We follow options closely. We recently had huge put on individual equities. Also, look at the individual sentiment polls. The aai, tenweek moving average is the highest since last october. A lot of fear. Look at seasonality. We all know december is strong, about 2 . Eight of the last nine years, the s p from black friday to the end of the year is higher every single time, eight out of nine, and the average is up, you know, around 5 . Last year we were up about 8. 5 from that time frame. You know, mark twain says history doesnt repeat. Got it. Got it. Okay. Rick, let me ask you before we go, if you get any sort of semblance of a framework that something is going to happen between now and the end of the year, say by christmas, as the president said he wanted to have happen today, what happens to the Interest Rates . Oh, theres no doubt in my mind that any kind of a solution is going to give us a strong rally in stocks. It depresses me a bit, actually, scott. I dont even think it needs to be a good deal. Just any deal, and then that leaves us with the notion of how to tackle Economic Growth beyond the fiscal cliff. Thats where it really starts to get interesting. I agree. I dweguess the market would ral so much before it even got to the details. Thats the irony. It really would. Its all about sentiment. Its about two sides acting like adults saying, lets do this together. Its what the people want. Im in. Lets leave it there, guys. All right, gentlemen. Thank you so much for weighing in. All right. Lets get a quick round up of todays winners and losers now. Kayla has been busy over the last hour. She joins us to wrap up the action. Scott, im wearing my sneakers today, running between desks. You saw the markets as they ended on the highs of the day after that positive wall stre j. Of course, following the bullish comments from president obama. Not all stocks ended the day in the green. Lets look at the laggards on the s p. You have a lot of names that arent really a surprise to be there. Avon, r. R. Donnelly. Those are your top five losers on the s p. It you look at the flip side, you have a lot of consumer names. The costcos, jcpenneys and coaches as well. Finally, i want to take a look at the banking index. That ended on the highs of the day along with the overall market. We should watch for paul volcker tomorrow on some news potentially about how that regulation is actually going to shape up today. Thank you, kayla. All right. Groupon a big winner today, up 11 . The report says the board is looking to replace the ceo, andrew mason. Today, mason spoke out about that report. It was interesting to say the least. Julia boorstin has the details. Thats right. Interesting to say the least. Ahead of a Board Meeting tomorrow, groupon ceo andrew mason took the stage at the Business Insider ignition conference to give a frank assessment of his job performance. Heres what he had to say. Heres a news flash. Our stock is down about 80 since we ipoed a year ago. It would be weird if the board wasnt discussing whether im the right guy to do the job. Were experiencing that volatility now as we predicted when we did the ipo a year ago. If i ever thought that i wasnt the right guy for the job, id be the first person to fire myself. And mason would have to fire himself, as long as he maintains the support of follow board members, the three of them together control 55 of groupons voting shares. His comments did help lift the stock 7. 5 today after a start to move higher on the reports that the board is talking about ousting him, which first came out yesterday after the bell. Mason did acknowledge groupons challenges like a slowdown in europe. He defended how well groupon works for small businesses, saying the press focuses too much on the handful of crashes rather than groupons many regular smooth landings. Michelle. All right. Thank you very much, julia. Want to tell you about disney, right . Big hike in the dividend, by 15 cents to 75 cents, up 25 . You have so Many Companies racing to pay special dividends or raise their dividends before the end of the year because the potential change in tax policy due to the fiscal cliff. And this one is payable on december 28th. What isnt clear to me is was it already payable on december 28th and they moved up the, or was it always paid on that date . It is a big move. Take a look at shares of walt disney right now. 75 cents per share, higher by 15 cents, up from 60 cents per share. Comes on the same day we heard of a Dividend Increase from costco. Yep. Youve had walmart, Las Vegas Sands in the last 24 to 48 hours. So this tide of special Dividend Payments comes as the fiscal cliff woes. Theyre doing something with the money. John fortt has more breaking news on that ncr speculation we were talking about earlier that halted that stock and another. What do we know now . No longer speculation, scott. This company is doing mna with its cash and taking on some debt. Ncr looking to buy retalix, its an israeli company, for a total value of around 600 million, about 30 per share. Included in that is just over 130 million that retalix has on the books. Ncr says its looking to do this with a combination of cash and debt. Thats interesting because ncrs market cap is 1 billion. Theyre looking to add a little debt, use a little cash, and get this company, which has been doing quite well in software, for a point of sale, retail, other areas. It had been acquiring, expanding. Ncr hoping to pick this up and fuel its growth into next year. All right, john. Thank you so much. Stick around. Were going to do more on todays big comeback market after the break. And as the clock ticks on the fiscal cliff, president obama is meeting behind those closed doors at the white house with a whos who list of ceos. A lot. Our cameras are right outside the white house. Well certainly keep you posted on the very latest developments there. Up next, its not just the mitt romneys of the world who will take a hit for higher tax rates on dividends next year. Wait. You hear how widespread the pain will be felt among ordinary americans. Later, save my 401 k . Americans pour millions into these nest eggs because of tax benefits. Someone here says those breaks could be chopped to cut the deficit. Are those worries overblown . A heated debated is coming up. Music is a universal language. But when i was in an accident. I was worried the Health Care System spoke a language all its own with unitedhealthcare, i got help that fit my life. Information on my phone. Connection to doctors who get where im from. And tools to estimate what my care may cost. So i never missed a beat. Were more than 78,000 people looking out for more than 70 million americans. Thats health in numbers. Unitedhealthcare. Lets get to Mary Thompson who has more on some of market action. More actually on all these Companies Paying out these dividends, michelle. Consider this. Last year only 44 members of the russell 3 o 3 000 had paid out a special dividend. Why the rush . Investors want to push out cash before the tax rates jump. Take a look at these Company Names behind us. Theyre the one december clalar special dividends. On december 18th, a retail warehouse costcos payout, one of the ten largest out so far this quarter. In total, those ten firms distributing 9. 4 billion to investors before the start of the new year. Now, in addition to special onetime payouts, some firms are accelerating regular dividends so shareholders wont be hit with a higher tax bill next year. Among those firms, walmart, ethan allen. In a note, citi says its expecting more firms to pay a special dividend before year end. Among the possible they named, best buy and walgreens. All right, mary. Thanks so much. Speaking of dividends, if these tacks go up because of any possible tax changes next year, Warren Buffett may not be the only one getting hurt. Cnbc. Coms Senior Writer jeff cox says ordinary americans would be impacted as well. Jeff, whats at stake here . How can higher dividend rates hurd ordinary investors . How about if you own a blue chip stock . How about if you have a 401 k . In any of these cases, you could face direct or indirect hits from potential, as mary just pointed out, dividend tax rates. As i point out here, dividends arent just for rich people. Its not just mitt romney and Warren Buffett. The damage is spread around. The Downside Risk to this is very steep, hearing a lot of talk about folks wanting to do some other things. Diversification getting out of these dividend paying stocks and into things like Corporate Bonds and munis. Forget about the fiscal cliff for now. The income cliff, if youre an investor whos living off of dividend income, senior citizen, whatever, you are a tremendous risk here. David, all you have to look at it the news we just brought you some 15 minutes ago. That disney is now raising the dividend payable december 28th. Why . Because its a few days before the fiscal cliff. Today, costco, walmart, Las Vegas Sands, dil lards. The list goes on and on. Its been a tidal wave. Its important to everybody. Thats why theyre doing it. Let me just correct a couple things jeff said. First of all, what president obama is proposing is to just raise those dividend taxes on people making over it 200,000 or 250,000. The ordinary retiree is not going to be hit by this at all. Thats one mistake. Second, you have to keep in mind the last time we saw dividend tax rates go up in the tax reform after june, the stock market did nine. It did quite well during both those periods. One other thing to note is that if you have a 40 1 k your dividends are not being taxed. Youd be exempt from this as well. Jeff, weigh in. As far as a 401 k goes, youre right in the sense youre not going to get a direct hit. Im talking about an indirect hit. Same thing if youre in an i. R. A. If you start to see an exodus from these dividend paying stocks and this goes back to the point before about why are they doing these dividend raises, its because theyre concerned about losing investors who are in these stocks specifically for the dividend. David, isnt that the point of the whole discussion . If this wasnt a serious issue and it didnt affect such a wide swath of people, why would these companies be racing to beat the deadline by issuing special dividends . Its nice for shareholders. I think all those early payouts are a massive gift to very wealthy shareholders. Thats the popular thing to do. Why not do it if they can legal do it . I reject that premise completely. Hold on. These are corporate profits. When you own a share in a company, youre an owner of the company. The company pays taxes on their profits. Then they distribute them. So when you tax a dividend, youre double taxing it. Its already been taxed once. Right. So by that logic, lets get rid of all taxes on dividends so wealthy heirs basically pay no taxes. Pension funds would be better off. Everybody would be better off. Look, one of the problems with these, you got to keep in mind, dividend tax rates right now are at a historically low level. They were much higher in the 1990s during that bull market. They were higher in the 1980s. Not relevant to my point i was making. Youre talking about completely different Economic Conditions as well. Youre talking about a country thats scraping the bottom, coming from a recession, where any level of contraction is going to be damaging. Jeff, we have to cut you off. Bob is waiting. You know how he gets. Guys, good discussion. Thank you. All right. We started 100 points down. We finished 100 points up. Bob, its a fiscal cliff soap opeon on the opera on the street. We dropped about 10 00. We had disappointing october new home sales. That was one little disappointing piece of data. We rallied about 100 points after 10 00 p. M. John boehner, speaker of the house, said hes optimistic a deal could be done. We rallied another 70 or 80 points at noon as president obama said he was trying to make a deal on the fiscal cliff by christmas. Thats what the market wants to hear, they want a date. Then we had a little bit of move towards the close as we heard qe4 may be coming at the next fed meeting. That would be no surprise. Weve been talking about that for a while. Take a look at housing stocks. They did not participate in the rally. Unusually down beat news here from the october new home sales. September revised to the downside as well. I think the problem here is the inventory of new homes is very limited right now in a lot of parts of the country. That limited the up side. Retail stocks had a good day. Express had positive comments as well as american eagle. Thank you, bob. Labor making its voice heard on the fiscal cliff. Were going to speak with the head of the Service Employees international union, seiu. Theyre hot on protecting Social Security, medicare and medicaid from any cuts in the friscal cliff negotiations. Ceos meeting with president obama at the white house. That pow wow kicking off within the hour. Also ahead, this important story i plan to go to law school of a i graduated. Looks like my folks wont have enough money to put me through college. Well, the world needs Ditch Diggers too. Student loan debt nears the 1 trillion mark. Thats right. 1 trillion. New evidence college may not be worth it after all. Try running four. Ning a restaurant is hard, fortunately weve got ink. It gives us 5x the rewards on our internet, phone charges and cable, plus at Office Supply stores. Rewards we put right back into our business. This is the only thing weve ever wanted to do and ink helps us do it. Make your mark with ink from chase. Another retailer declaring a special dividend. Lets send it over to kayla for a quick market flash. That retailer is guess. That dividend came amid a lackluster quarter for the company. It beat on the top line but missed on the bottom line. It lowered guidance for next year and said store sales were down. Look at the stock. Up 3 after hours on 1. 20 per share special dividend announced this quarter. Investors like it. Companies are doing it. Weve seen a lot of these. Just on that note, and, you know, i dont know if kayla is going to stay there or not, but a lot of companies are paying for the special dividends with debt. Borrowing money. By borrowing money. We just mentioned how costco was one of these companies, another retailer, to kaylas point, thats issuing a special dividend. Theyre now announcing a Debt Offering as a result. Money is so cheap. You borrow it and give it to your shareholders in an effort to boost your stock. Not the last that were going see. A perfect example of how we insent vi insent vise debt in america. Ceos will be meeting with president obama. Mary kay henry is president of the Service Employees international union. Shes been on capitol hill imploring lawmakers to focus on tax issues now and spending issues later. Its great to have you on the show. Welcome. Thank you, scott. Glad to be here. Are you guys willing to put socalled entitlements on the table . Can we put those on the table, Social Security, medicare, all of these things that need to be dealt with . Scott, they were on the table a year ago. 1 trillion of cuts have already been made to those programs. We think the top priority is to have the wealthiest pay their fair share and get jobs created so we can spur the economic recovery. Okay. Lets pretend you got that tomorrow. Republicans say, thats it, were going to get it done. Were going to raise taxes on the upper income individuals. Then could we reform medicare . Well, if we get this country back to work, there is a lot of room to have a conversation about how it improve the delivery of health care, but we have millions of workers that are in jobs that dont provide any health care coverage. I didnt get a good answer. At what point would you be willing to put it on the table . Does the Unemployment Rate have to fall to 7 , 6. 5 . At what point can we have a serious discussion about entitlement in this country . Weve been having a serious discussion because cuts have happened to these programs over an over while the bush tax cuts have been in effect. 1 trillion has been taken off the table for the last eight years. I dont think its too much to ask for the wealthiest americans to pay their fair share to get the economy going again so we can restore the american middle class and get people back to work. Why not tell wealthy seniors theres going to be means testing in medicare and theres going to be means testing in Social Security . If you have 1 million in the bank, you cant have Social Security. That would be raising taxes on the wealthy. How about that . I think those are valid conversations, but what im trying to argue is that it should not be connected to this conversation about okay. I disconnected it. Were going to go to the land of make believe. Weve raised taxes on the people you want to raise taxes on. Would you be willing to means test Social Security and medicare in order to bend the cost curve . I think we have to have a large conversation thats no. Thats an evasive answer. I agree. Im not willing to have that conversation until we get this country back to work, grow the economy from the middle out, put peoples money in peoples pockets so we can restore the robust economic recovery that this nation deserves. Youre not willing to rise above, as weve been saying here around cnbc, beyond your own selfinterest and those of the union that you represent. And very wealthy people. Wealthy, wealthy individuals and seniors who can afford a lot more. No, this is about a National Conversation where we just had a year long president ial debate on the but theres a nation willing to have a conversation. Youre not even willing to put entitlements on the table. Doesnt everything need to be on the table . Its a shared sacrifice. I dont think this is the right conversation because 23 Million People are out of work. Workers wages have not been raised in real dollars for the last 30 years in this economy. The only jobs being created are lowwage, minimumwage jobs without benefits or guaranteed hours. I think this is so strange. This is so strange. Maam, we have billionaires on cnbc all the time. They tell us they get a Social Security check. They use medicare. And you cant even tell me that those people shouldnt have access to those benefits. We cant even cut off millionaires. But youre going to raise taxes. Heres what we said when we created Social Security. That we wanted a minimum in this country and guaranteed social Insurance Program that has been turned into a notion that somehow its some entitlement as opposed to a guarantee of the basic common good in this country. So, no, i am not willing to connect the question of medicare, medicaid, and Social Security to a conversation that this nation has been delaying for too long, which is how are we all in this together . How does everybody pay their fair share . And how do we restore economic recovery by getting people back to work in jobs they can feed their families on . Ms. Henry, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you. Shes not rising above. I think that was a good observation on your part. Is anybody . No. Will your 4011 k go over the fiscal cliff . A trade group in washington warns that 4011 401 k tax benefits may get cut. Later weve encouraged them to go to college. At least try a semester, full year. Well, a lot of parents feel the same way as this college dad. With tuition soaring and Student Loan Debt near 1 trillion, is College Still worth the cost . Well talk bang for your college buck in the back half of the show. And as powerball players rev up for tonights 550 million drawing, states are making millions in the process. Should those hit hardest by Hurricane Sandy set money aside to help hurricane victims . Stick around. Having you ship my gifts couldnt be easier. Well, having a ton of locations doesnt hurt. And a santa to boot [ chuckles ] right, baby. Oh, sir. That is a customer. Oh. Sorry about that. [ male announcer ] break from the holiday stress. Fedex office. And his new boss told him two things cook what you love, and save your money. Joe doesnt know it yet, but hell work his way up from busser to waiter to chef before opening a restaurant specializing in fish and game from the great northwest. Hell start investing early, hell find some good people to help guide him, and hell set money aside from his first day of work to his last, which isnt rocket science. Its just common sense. From td ameritrade. Monarch of marketing analysis. With the ability to improve roi through seo all by cob. And you. Rent from national. Because only national lets you choose any car in the aisle. And go. You can even take a fullsize or above, and still pay the midsize price. Im going big. [ male announcer ] good choice business pro. Good choice. Go national. Go like a pro. Glnchts theres a shot of the white house. The meeting between president obama and efrl of the nations ceos set to begin momentarily, about ten minutes away. You have the ceos today of goldman sachs, caterpillar, our boss at comcast, marriott, and many other top executives there. We saw jimmy lee earlier there. All of them trying to rise above. Well, theyre rising above. Its unfortunately, many of the people theyre visiting with arent. Exactly. We need to get a boat load of pins to our elected officials. There it is. 60 million American Workers covered by a 401 k or similar retirement plan. Brian warns that the tax benefits that go along with those plans could be on the chopping block in the tax debate brewing in washington. That will severely curb retirement savings. But financialed a vie or natalie pace says these are concerns that are being way overblown. Both join us now. Make your case, natalie. Why are they being overblown in. The only discussion ive heard of is in the ways and means committee. The republican chairman said he wants to simplify it, make it more efficient, and also get more contributions, not less. So i havent heard anybody saying they need to chop the 40 k. In fact, i wish the power of this organization and this website would be protecting our 40 40 1 k. Brian, are you overdoing it . Absolutely not. The Simpson Bowles plan cuts contributions. The last time they did tax reform, they cut the limit by 71 . All of these proposals like capping deductions, like limiting the tax benefits associated with these plans, all of them impact 40 k plans. The president s Budget Proposal caps the benefits at 28 . Its in the budget. People would not be able to put away as much as they had before the minute you can put stuff in, thats money that cant be taxed. Thats revenue that doesnt go to the government. But of course, you as the individual suffer. Thats your point. Thats exactly the point. The problem is if they take these incentives away, people are not going to save. In fact, Research Shows that the lowest income quartile thats most sensitive to the tax break, they wont save as much. Natalie, lets say this does happen. What would be the fallout . Would people save less . Would plans shrink in. That sounds like a very iffy proposition. The basic fact is that we have to get this budget passed before the end of the year. Tax reform of the nature that would be required to reform our entire system would require too much debate to get it done. So i think this iffy proposition is something that is really diverting away from the true reform that is needed right now. Again, i really wish the power of this website was saving it from whats really happening, which is people are draining it to try to pay off debt. Thats a serious issue. That is something that we should be addressing. Congress is not going to happen before the end of the year. Thats when the deal has to be done by. But the spirit of scotts question was, if it does happen, wouldnt it be negative for Savings Rates . It would disincentivize people to save, wouldnt it . Yeah, but im not hearing anything that its going to happen. Again, whats going on in the ways and mean the committee is they want to simplify the process, make it more efficient, and encourage more contributions, not less. So this will be a battle, perhaps, but it wont be a battle this year. Im not hearing anybody say thats what they want, and they had white house support. This is bipartisan support to make it easier, more efficient, and more contributions. Got it. Thank you, guys. All right. When the president invites you to meet at the white house, you go, right . Goldman sachs Lloyd Blankfein among the ceos in attendance. Were monitoring it. Keep it here. And 1 trillion. Thats how much Student Loan Debt has risen to. Is a College Degree really worth it . Well discuss that next. Plus, theres more than one winner in tonights powerball drawing. States are guaranteed to make tens of millions just from the sales of the tickets. But are they using the money for the right thing . You sounded like that mike myers character there. Time to toast todays close with this. Foot traffic in retail sales were both higher during this fourday thanksgiving break. The average amount spent per day for the entire week is down. In 2011, consumers reported spending 83 per day on average, according to gallop. Com. So how much did they spend this year . Find out next. Or that printing in color had to cost a fortune. Nobody said an allinone had to be bulky. Or that you had to print from your desk. At least, nobody said it to us. Introducing the business smart inkjet allinone series from brother. Easy to use. Its the ultimate combination of speed, small size, and lowcost printing. Sfx sounds of african drum and flute look whos back. Again . Its embarrassing its embarrassing we can see you carl. We can totally see you. Come on youre better than this. All that prowling around. Yeah, youre the king of the jungle. Have you thought about going vegan carl . Hahaha you know folks who save hundreds of dollars by switching to geico sure are happy. How happy are they jimmy . Happier than antelope with nightvision goggles. Nice get happy. Get geico. Fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more. [ male announcer ] this december, remember what starts with adding a friend. Could end with adding a close friend. The lexus december to remember sales event is on, offering some of our best values of the year. Tis the pursuit of perfection. When we got married. I had three kids. And she became the full time mother of three. It was soccer, and ballet, and cheerleading, and baseball. Those years were crazy. So, as we go into this next phase, you know, a big part of it for us is that there isnt anything on the schedule. A toast to todays market close. How much did consumers spend during thanksgiving week this year . An average of 67 per day. Thats down from 2011 and 2010 and even lower than the average amount spent in 2009. Who do we see arriving . Oh, our boss just arrived at the white house. Brian roberts, the ceo of comcast. Rising above, meeting with the president to give encouraging words about solving the fiscal cliff. Several of the nations top ceos at the white house today to meet with president obama. Thats the ceo of yahoo of course. Frank blake of home depot is there. How did you know it was her before you saw her face . Im just that good. Youre just that good . Theres not many blond female ceos walking into the white house. I may have been tipped off. I may. Not only am they good, our control room is even better. All right. Close to 1 trillion. Thats how much this country has in outstanding Student Loan Debt right now. Plus, a Record Number of people are falling behind on their student loan payments. For the first time, Student Loans 90 days overdue surpassed Credit Card Debt in the third quarter. So this raises the question, especially in todays job market, is it all really worth it . Especially since taxpayers are on the hook for the loans if they default. Neil mccluskey says theres an overemphasis on a College Degree. He joins us along with our own scott cohn. Guys, good to have you. Neil, look, i dont know. It would be great to be the next mark zuckerberg. I think wed all love to be that. An overemphasis on a College Degree, i dont know about that. Well, there are two big numbers you need to know. First, about half, about 50 of people who go to college never finish. Many of them are going to take out loans. Theyre going because theyre told Everyone Needs to go to college whether theyre right for it or not. Those people are being sold a bill and taxpayers are on the hook for their loans and federal grants. And onethird of people with bachelors degrees earn jobs that dont require that degree. That shows huge swaths of americans already Consumer College that they dont need and that doesnt pay off for them. Scott, youre not surprised by these numbers, right . You did a documentary about what we thought would be the coming crisis in Student Loan Debt. Its arriving, isnt it . It had arrived. Two years ago we did this documentary. We had a lot of the same issues. The delinquencies and the question of whether college is worth it. I want to show you a clip from our documentary price of admissi admission. We talked to people who have been mired in student debt and their per spigspectives on the College Education they borrowed for. Nick and emily with a quarter of a Million Dollars between them in student debt. Kyle mccarthy with more than 70,000 in student debt. Listen to what they had to say about college in retrospect. You dont have to go to college. Work for a year. Find out what you want to do. Dont discover yourself in college and pay all this money. By no means am i saying dont go to college. Thats not what im saying at all. People have to be aware of what theyre getting themselves into. I mean, pretty much anybody can take out a student loan, and they dont know what theyre getting into. At the time, they didnt know what kind of job market they were getting into. Nick and emily both did find jobs. Now theyre paying back those loans. Kyle found a better job. Hes still in debt. Now hes working as an activist trying to get reforms in student loan system. Neil, the bottom line, i guess, to this whole thing is college is probably just too expensive at the end of the day. Yeah, and college is too expensive because primarily the federal government will give almost anyone limitless amounts of money to go to college, regardless of their demonstrated academic ability or desire. Thats not exactly right. Colleges raise their prices at great speeds, far in excess of health care. Thats not exactly right that anybody can get money to go to college regardless. You cant just the borrowing is an issue, clearly. People can get loans without underwriting. One of the main issues that is causing College Tuition to go up is that state aid is decreasing, so they have to rely more on tuition. And theres this whole issue of demand. Everybody thinks that they need a College Degree. Scott, we got to run. I have to ask you a quick question. As the unemployment remains high, and we have such a jobs crisis in this country, are we at risk of more defaults on Student Loans, a real bursting of a bubble . Were at risk of more defaults. Were at risk of a whole generation of people that should be at their greatest earning power, being burdened by these Student Loans. The good issue for the taxpayers is that you cant walk away from a student loan the way you can from a mortgage. So people will ultimately have to pay these back. Yeah, its the only thing you cant get out of no matter what. All right. Thank you, guys. Coming up next, should new york and new jersey fork over some of the proceeds from tonights 550 million Powerball Lottery to help Hurricane Sandy victims . Were going to talk about that on the other side of the break. Keep it here. If we want to impe our schools. What should we invest in . Maybe New Buildings . What about updated equipment . They can help, but recent Research Shows. Nothing transforms schools like investing in advanced teacher education. Lets build a strong foundation. Lets invest in our teachers so they can inspire our students. Lets solve this. Power ball frenzy sweeping the nation as the jackpot hits 550 million. Nbcs jay gray is in dallas where the tickets are being at a fast and furious pace. Jay . Reporter yeah, were at fuel city where they sell a ton of gas. They have great tacos here. They sell a lot of other things too. As you can see the big ticket item today obviously has been those tickets. First you have the group that came in before work this morning, then the lunchtime crowd came in, now were getting a bit of lull before the end of work group makes their way through to buy tickets. And we expect this place to be jam packed like it has been throughout the day today. They are selling at a fast pace, not only here in dallas, but across the country, a lot of work going on, and right now the Associated Press just reporting the rate of sales is 130,000 tickets every minute right now. Theyve already sold more than 1 billion worth of tickets. You know, that 1 out of every 2 that is spent on a ticket goes to the state selling that ticket. A lot of states obviously use that to Fund Programs including education here in texas and some other programs. I hate to say this because there are some a few hours left to buy tickets, unfortunately, i have it on good word that the Winning Ticket has been sold here in texas, michelle. So yeah, youre holding it in your hand right now. I can see those numbers. Thats right. Thank you, jay. A former reporter, jay gray. Thats right. His last live shot. Did you know that no matter who wins the power ballotry, all participating states are winners . For every 2 spent on a power ball ticket, 1 goes to the state. And the state of the eventual winner will get a windfall if they have an income tax. What is that ticket is sold in new jersey or new york . The two hardest hit states from Hurricane Sandy. Should they amend the windfall to cover the costs . Texas doesnt have a state income tax, by the way. Just to play off jay grays story. Katherine thinks its a good idea. Katherine, to play off reason magazine, that seems reasonable, huh . The dirty secret of the lottery is the winner is always the state governments, getting this huge amount of revenue. I actually think, you know, right now new york and a lot of other states, the money they get from lotteries goes to education. And you might say, oh, its a tough call, teachers or hurricane victims, but in the last three decades, weve doubled education spending on a National Level and we dont have much to show for it test scores wise. I think lets take some of that cash from the teachers, give it to the hurricane victims where it can do a little more good. Maybe there should be special exemptions at times like these where you have new york and new jersey where the cost of the hurricane is going to rise, i dont know, what 20 billion, i think or at least near that is what at least in new york city what the cost could be. Sure, and, you know, frankly theres something that i always find a little bit a little iffy about the lottery, which is that the people who play by and large are on the lower end of the income scale. Poor people pay the lottery more, but that money goes to Fund Services people in the middle class like education. It actually seems to me like a little bit of a better outcome if we are going to assume that still poor people are buying a lot of these lottery tickets. Dont a lot of these states, though, the way they sell a lottery in the first place is dont worry all the moneys going for education. Of course, people dont realize moneys fundable, so they take from somewhere else. It doesnt increase the amount on education, but dont a lot of states have in the constitution, change the constitution in order to achieve what you want to do, right . Thats true. And youre right to say this notion that somehow lottery money is like magical and can only go to education and its insulated from the rest of the state budget is pretty artificial. But, you know, that said, i think in times of national crisiseven crisis, there often is kind of enough will to do major legislative initiatives or to amend the constitution, and if new york and energy want to do that, great. I like reason magazine a lot. Me too. They seem very reasonable. Call them fiscal cliff spikes and dives, will the market swings continue tomorrow morning . Weve got three top money pros to weigh in next. And were keeping an eye on the closeddoor meeting at the white house between president obama and ceos to tackle the fiscal cliff. Theres a look at the white house right there live as youre watching cnbc first in business worldwide. At optionsxpress were all about options trading. We create easytouse, powerful Trading Tools for all. Look at these streaming charts theyre totally customizable and they let you visualize what might happen next. Thats genius we knew you needed a platform that could really help you elevate your trading. So we built it. Chances of making this . Its a lot easier to find out if a trade is potentially profitable. Just use our trade probability calculator and there it is. For all the reasons you trade options from income to Risk Management to diversification youll have the tools to get it done. 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But in the long run, its very good for corporate america, corporate earnings, and the global economy, as well. And for my gas tank, as well. Sandy, youve got 30 seconds. Yeah, tomorrow, were going to be watching gdp numbers, revised gdp of 2. 8 . Mostly watching dallas fed president fisher who is going to talk about the fiscal challenges in the u. S. And abroad. You look at yesterday, harry reid opens his mouth, no deal done and market falls 80, today boehner comes out saying that tax revenue is on the table and here we are up 100 points. Ill be buying good Quality Growth Companies that any fallback from the fiscal cliff and im going to be buying. Your 30 seconds starts now. Yeah, well, today the s p 500 tested the 200day moving average. As we close out the month of november. Weve seen relative strength in small cap stocks over large cap stocks. Were looking for that relationship to hold up, as well. And tomorrow well be looking at the growth number, which of course, consensus will expect an increase. We dont think itll be a game changer because of the head winds such as the fiscal cliff, but we think itll contribute to optimism about the economy. Youre in a