a st.. you helped me and sodium convincing despite the evidence you just dug-in which told me you had to be right to your critics were jealous. they did better appreciate your skills all of those titles that you won on that bike you've made it so clear now i know. they were right and you were spinning wheels a and lies and defrauding a nation of imbeciles who trusted you. who would mired you know, you want to make things right? wrong. you are allying deceiving phonied despicable dense. you made your fame climbing mountains. climb another one to stay electronics show starting

tomorrow. melissa: i am melissa francis and this is what is "money" tonight. are these guys allergic to spending cuts? you will not play the ideas being floated to pay for the pork in washington. today's power panel will be here to crunch the numbers. here is $10,000. allstate insurance lowball the staten island family for super storm sandy damages that did not stop allstate from using their home in a commercial patting themselves on the back. now they're suing an in here to explain why. you probably have too much money when you start to buy solid gold clothing. we have all the details even when they sait is not, it is always about "money."

all right, first let's take a look at the market headlines. posting their best week in more than a year. profit-taking largely to blame, the dowel dowell dow fell. the banks acsed of improperly foreclosing on close to 4 million borrowers. in 2009 and 2010. eligible owners get a little bit more than $3 billion in direct payments as part of the settlement. shares of boeing fell 2% after a fire broke out on an empty 7873 minor jet. -- three minor jet. the cause of the fire is under investigation, but you can see

shareholders didn't like it, the stocks down 2%. the first story, what is on everybody's mind these days, texas. an editorial got our attention in "the new york times" advertisinadvocating a new way s never been used before like the backpacks. 77% ofmericans saw their taxes go up this month and it could be just the beginning. what it will mean for you and our economy in today's "money" power panel. my favorite professors back from the university of chicago. spencer patton, what do you think? you open "the new york times," just opening the door to a whole new wave of texas. -- taxes. are you thrilled about this come is a great idea?

>> if you want all this government and you have to pay for it, the truth is if we don't/government spending, you have to raise taxes on the middle class. the problem is there's no guarantee the higher taxes will go to reduce the deficit the government might just spending . money has been spent on relief aid for hurricane sandy. melissa: that is absolutely true. do you think if we give them more moneyhey will spend it -- is to die and pay their bills? >> america is already too vat already. i think it is exactly right. wh is the marginal expenses from a marginal dollar of taxes raised? is it less than a dollar? three years out it will be more than a dolr so if you raise a dollar in tax revenue from

higher taxes, while actually from anything, i expect what will happen is a dollar will be spent and it is not just a guess. in illinois we raised state income taxes about 75% three years ago, two, three years ago. look at the states around the united states with high taxes do any of them have a budget surplus? melissa: let me ask you, w wants to make sure everybody knows that is a value-added tax. it basically ended up really hitting lower income and middle income folks the most because on the march a larger% of their income. what do you think it means for the economy if we added a value-added tax for everything we do and buy? >> it is disaster. anytime you're charging the consumer more to gto the

government, you're going t have a serious issue tha with a government that has no control over the balance sheet. i find it so interestingly occupy walter movement was all about the 1% and how they were the problem, and now you hear how we're going to tax the top 2% and you see that number grow. i would bet my left arm by the end of his presidency will be talking about the top 5% or the top 10% and that number will keep growing because the problem with socialism and those many states believe you will see running out of other peoples pes money, that is the problem. melissa: that is always what happens in the end. why is the value-added tax a bad idea? for some it might just seem like another sales tax. it doesn't seem to be that big of a problem, why is a value-added tax not a good idea? >> i don't think it is a bad

idea that replaces the tax. it is better to raise taxes through consumption than taxing income and investments. the problem is it will not replace the income tax, that will be on top of the income tax and that is going to be the problem growing government instead ofddressing the real problem, which is spending. president obama wants to protect middlthe middle class from highr taxes. the ways to protect them from bigger government because the middle class has to pay for g government and we are running huge deficits the federal reserve creates all kinds of inflation to monetize those deficits and that it attacked an average americans to the price of food go up, gasoline go up, prices are rising because of big governmentnd inflation used to finance it. melissa: what about a carbon tax? th sounds like big companies and looters and people using carbon will be the ones to pay the tax that would impt all of us. what impact would it have on the average person and what about

the economy? >> what peter was ying was absolutely right. you can ok at the taxes individually and you can say some of them would be a good idea. a vat or carbon tax on their own bases could be a good tax. it is a pile on top of others, there is a problem. why is a carbon tax potentially a good tax becaus of externalities. carbon imposes a lot of cost of other ople, and instead of indirect taxes, the easiest thing to do, the simplest thing to do is just in effect make gas more effective. but theseust become energy stream and one more thing about the carbon taxes, what they do is they often by grandfathering in current polluters, they are a giant giveaway to the friends of

the current administration. melissa: is a great point nobody talks about. clearly we could spend all night on this, but i want to move on, maybe i'm looking at this all wrong. we should bite the bullet and early tax people and pay down the debt once and for all. if we just grit our teeth and raise taxes once and for all as tax everyone 40%, no exemptions, nothing, just 40%, we could wipe out the debt in three years. a good idea? >> not a chance. melissa: why? >> did you check your math? melissa: so maybe it takes four years, five years, why not tax everybody 40%? >> even if you raise taxes to 100%, you could not pay it off. the only question is how can we do it, will we do it honestly or through inflation?

it is impossible to pay the debt off. when you look at the unfunded liabilities that dwarf the official debt, we cannot tax our way out of this problem, we have to tke a meat hook to government spending including entitlements. melissa: i thought it was a good idea and i was way off. let's just tax the hell out of everybody, tighten our belts, five years from now we can see down the whole thing, come on. >> here is the problem, there are a couple of problems. the first problem is basically what president obama and the high spending democrats would really like to do is ultimately raise the portion of the government in our economy from its traditional 20% up to about 25%. they have gradually been doing that. no amount of taxes that you add

on would pay for it and in addition it would grow economic growth. the second problem is nobody on the spending side is tackling the big drivers of this, which are the unfunded liabilities, and the only way you get at those is by structural changes. you have to gradually raise retirement age, but you do not hear any democrats talking aut it in their own power. >> we have to do it right now, how to cut the benefits people currently receiving them. they cannot afford them. melissa: why does the math not work, why is it getting away with a? they can't just raise taxes on everybody and pay for this problem? that is what they make it seem like in washington, we all pay a littleit more and we can solve this problem. >> that it's really not the answer, spending is clearly the problem.

i would love to see a progrowth policy. u.s. gdp being 3% or 4% range rather than one and a half hopefully type range you could get a great deal of government revenue you can finally tackle a little bitf entitlements and take those down, increase retirement age is, that is how you tackle this debt. this is possible. give us a progrowth policies, get rid of the regulations and get rid of the carbon tax, the vat, lower taxes. melissa: would he to. if you're trying to explain it to somebody who was not politilly invested and just looking at the numbers, why does it not look? it is growing so fast it is getting away from us, cannot tax for certain% of people stop working. what is the fundamental reason why this would not work.

>> government is promising a bunch of free stuff, that is how president obama got elected. the fact of the matter is it is not free, it is very expensive and the middle class is going to have to pay for it but we simply can't afford the amount of government we have been promised and you have the government trying to write the giant ponzi schemes. it can't work, it is impossible to reform these programs in the way it will work. we have to acknowledge that and will never get the kind of economic growth you're talking about 4%, 5% per year unless we let the economy restructure. they had to let interest rates go up, they are much too low to encourage savings and investments aninvestmentand allo restructure meaning a lot of people have to lose a lot of money. people have to stop spending so they can start saving so to have capital investments needed to grow the economy.

melissa: i think i'm depressed, none of those things will happen. power panel, thank you very much. coming up next on "money," the u.s. now has the most exnsive corn. fresh government subsidies and ethanol production could be to blame, but we have fallout from consumers. super storm sandy destroys a family's home. and all they got was $10,000 from allstate. but the insurer us their home for a congratulatory commercial. can you believe that? why they are now preparing to sue. more "money" coming up. ♪ [ male announcer ] how do you me 70,000 trades a second... ♪ reach one customer at a time? ♪ or help doctors turn billions of bytes of shared information...

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melissa: now onto the corn prices. the world's most expensive corn. is it food and gas prices aren't high enough, companies are buying food from other countries because it is cheaper. you can blame the drought but you can also blame the ethanol mandate. great to see you, scott, thank you for coming on e show. >> no problem.

melissa: while 77% of americans saw their tax bill go up, people will be happy to hear ethanol makers were able to keep their tax breaks. they extended the $1.01 per tax credit ethanol makers and allow them to continue to depreciate their equipment, what do you think about that? >> it has been 10 or 12 years now that the government has been in bed with the ethanol makers. lately the administration is much greener than it was with bush and not the new solyndra but the answer to getting ourselves off of foreign oil, middle east but at the end of the day it takes more energy to pull it out of the crowd and transported. it is a short-term solution that they will stick with for the short term. melissa: one day we're putting corn into youras tank and it is so clean on the political

shows, but look at the market distortions that have come into play as result of that. in 2010 we didn't import an acorn from brazil. all the sexy big $10 million imports over all of corn. went up 55% last year. so why are we importing corn when we have a lot of corn in the country right now, what is the reason? you are a farmer. >> a lot of them are with a while back when we were really out of whack beuse we had this drought and we still have a drought worse than it was a while back. we will have another tough time next year. many more to get rid of the problem. they're thinking about unwinding qe causing the dollar to get stronger preening back into line. when the deals were being booked the dollar was really cheap.

it is not just one ing that will make it more expensive but you're right, one third of the balance sheet of corn goes to ethanol. melissa: i go to the store and buy corn or cereal or anything else corn is in, there's a lot of competition now. the drought killing part of the crop and also this fight to use it for fuel instead of food. maybe now's not the time to be turning precious corn into fuel. >> i agree with you. we have a family farm and if you took away the ethanol mandate that is thbiggest thing that keeps corn prices higher than they should be. you can imagine adding back in one third to the balance sheet, that would send the prices to the floor keeping the midwest farmer happy. des moines is first on the ballot. yowe have more competition

globally and we have seen a higher price rise in tho corn prices. the viewers have to be aware we are not getting the groundwater we need to have a successful year next year and most of these droughts at least two years and the dust bowl was four years. you have something to worry about it could be the fact we import more corn next year. melissa: your mention of corn prices collapse that would be very bad for corn farmers and that is not what we are rooting for. but chicken and everything that feeds on corn goes up. the things you buy i in the supermarket that contain corn go up. price of gasoline goes up because ethanol is expensive, so you're paying for it all over the place as a result of this. we appreciate it. time now foroday's fuel gauge. l rig has successfully pulled off of an alaskan island, finally. the coast guard says the rate has reached the harbor off of

kodiak island. they can now further assess damage to the rig after it ran aground on december 31. iran oil minister said crude exports have 40% over the past nine months. blaming us-l sanctions on the decline. also says iran's revenor oil and gas exports have dropped 45% during that time. it largely quiet day for oil futures, rising $0.10 to settle at $93.19 per barrel. coming up on "money," couples house was completely ruined by super storm sandy. but after being stiffed on their claim by allstate, the insurance giant used their home in a commercial patting itself on the back for all of their great help getting staten island. the family is ready to sue and they're here to explain. plus, why wal-marts biggest

competitors are crying foul ov their new ad campaign. can you ever have too much "money"? i don't think so. we will be right back.

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melissa: now onto a story that reminds us a bit of david and goliath. a couple suffered catastrophic damage to their home during homg super storm sandy. they filed a claim with allstate but the insurance company only pays them 10 grand. the best part of this is allsta actually used images of the couple's home in itself for fight commercial basically saying how great the companies for helping all the victims of the storm. check this out. >> some of them lost their houses, all of them lost their power. worried about their families. but none of them forgot about

their customers. allstate would like to thank the 1000 agents living in sandy's path despite their own problems with their customers problems first. you truly are agents of good. melissa: you cannot make this stuff up. thank you, it is hard for you to watch that ad. that is your house at the very beginning with yellow tape going across, that was your house. >> yes, and my kitchen window. melissa: they say the agent came in and help and were there and to thank the agents in the past, what was your experience like? >> not that. we got a call from our neighbor that our house fell down by the wind, the wind took the house down said i heard a noise, looked out the kitchen window and your roof is on the ground.

so my husband said where is the water? said it isn't just coming up now. in essence the wind took our hous down. melissa: when allstate came in and look at it, they decided instead of getting the $280,000 that would be the value of your home since it was totally destroyed, they would give you $10,000, what was the explanation? >> that was for the roof and the rest was caused by the storm surge. >> it was ridiculous, we knew what happened, we were told what happened, they sent an engineer down to look at it almost a month later. how can you determine anything at the sanitation had to remove everything. melissa: we have so many people even here in this building infected by this storm and are now locked in this situation with their insurance company where the insurance company says we will not pay you because of this.

a lot of people in this fight right now. adding insult to injury, you are having dinner and her granddaughter says to you there is an ad o tv. and there is the ad we just played, how did you feel you saw them taking credit for doing such a great job helping people in here you are in this battle with them. >> we were locked in a battle the house was taken down by a storm surge, we had a witness and went to our agent and we were right there on the phone with the guy, said he heard a noise in the house ludhian who d the water was not even there yet. in the insurance company, the agent says is like which came first, the chicken or thegg? melissa: how did you feel when you saw the ad? >> i got sick. we were watching a game and the grandkids haveelled there is

your house, grandpa. i said what, the hack. they were advertising in that commercial. we are still waiting to hear from these people to see what they're going to do for us. melissa: allstate says he advertised in question shows general images of destruction caused by sandy including a partial image of your home and does not reference u.s. customers or in any way implied that you are satisfied with the status of their claims. how do you feel about that? >> that is a lot of horse manure, that is ridiculous what they are saying. >> our agent knew, they knew that we weren happy with the settlement and what ey were saying from the storm surge. we knew it was from the wind. >> they don't believe you, they don't, they will do what they want to do. melissa: i hope you'll keep us up-to-date on what happened. i am sure this is getting their atntion. the world and the media is

watching how they treat you and our prayers are with you. >> they talk a good speech, they do. melissa: tellis results and we will setup of this. >> thank you. melissa: is wal-mart using false advertising to win the low price war? competitors up in arms over tv ad campaign. details coming up next. plus, if you want a huge raise, big promotion, listen up. one of the undisputed masters of negotiation joins us with an inside look at what your new year's resolution. piles of "money" coming up.

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♪ melissa: so, all money walmart under fire for price match ads that specifically called out their competitors and prices. watch this. >> her christmas list, looking for gifts at toys r us. more items of walmart for lower price. >> i don't know. >> let's go see. over $11 less. >> that's great. >> and assembly is free. toys r us charges to knocks. melissa: pretty convincing. what if he found that those prices were no eal. walmart making inaccurate claims about products, including computers and iphones. the rivals are filing complaints

saying that the ads mislead consumers. here's the thing. do these ads help any way? t. j. walker is here to answer that, media analyst and ceo media trading worldwide. they had to go to a sort of lengths in order to make this true. some items, it was cheaper, but ere were things that they did, the "wall street journal" says there were comparing computers and were not as if this same. to say that there were a different price, one is an older model or does not have this amount of memory. others said they use an iphone five but they have a limited supply as opposed to if he had gone into best buy when they have zillions. a lot of the competitors are saying it is not fair. >> it was not a smart strategy. a clever tactic, but a stupid strategy. walmart looks like a bully. they may be technically right, but prices change every two sends, and it just seems unfair. it seems like a bait and switch.

the problem walmart has says, they're the a hundred pound gorilla. everyone knows they are. they're held to higher standards. they cannot seem like a bully. melissa: but does that stake? at thing people at home, they're bu picking up kids from school, finishing the christmas list. there not watching. you see it go by, see the price comparison. and they assembled for free. the impression is that they're cheaper, and that's what really sticks. >> the problem is the bestbuy and toys r us are getting all of this great publici. there is news generated by those companies going to attorneys general asking for government officials to say what walmart is doing is unfair. when you're in business is now like a political campaign where you have to get enough votes to win on tuesday and then you can relax. you're in it for the long term. walmart wants to be around not

by tuesday election day but in two weeks, two months, two years, two deades. melissa: the impression that there were a bully in that this was necessarily true is going to come and wipe out the idea that they were cheaper. are people really paying that much attention? >> here's the problem. there are so big that they're looking for growth. there not gog to lose billions of dollars in business, bu it hurts their good will. walmart has to grow go to different communities, and things like this give ammunition to local and state officials who are already looking for an excuse to say, walmart, you cannot come to our community. melissa: it seemed like in a good old days you could do that. but now, i mean to you go in the computer and its won praise from one computer and another from another. melissa: welcome the best buy is claiming that there were comparing one computer to a complete different brand. melissa: that's not legitimate at all.

melissa: for short, and that is definitely wrong. even with the exact same product, the price changes every day. if you go on amazon, pricing is so dynamic and not sure that you can do those commercials. does that strategy and work? >> it does. walmart already has a good reputation on price. there are sometimes seen as unfair and bullies. unfortunately, this sad place to their worst damage, not their best. melissa: thank you so much. here is our question of the day. the you think walmart price match ads are misleading? a few add that you sop at target instead. we want to hear what you think. follow me on twitter. all right. if you are determined to get ahead and work this year, we have got your guide. one of the great masters of strategy behind so many faces uc

here. he will tell us how to tap ino your killer motion to win that big promotion coming up next. it is all about money. ♪

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melissa: that was a good one. your new year's resolution is to get the bid bought -- big box from a huge raised a lot more promotion. this is for you. the strategic mastermind behind your favorite including these. my agent is here with the bible on how to get it done. super agent wrote the book. your killer emotions. there it is. he joins me now to share some of this amazing advice. >> it's a pleasure to be here. melissa: what did you read this book? >> the last 30 years i have cancelled thousands of people to make a great life choices. e thing i found is that when people are sad, when angry, when they feel this respected, when they are resentful, their emotions cloud their best judgment and then make self seven dozen decisions. i have seen time and time again

that this modest individuals, the people with the best life strategies, when they are overwhelmed by emotions, once again, they ardestructive. melissa: so true because people fe slighted, angry, want to lash out at the boss or supervisor or whoever it ended up only doing more damage to themselves. i love your buck. i read about how you can che yourself and control your emotions. some of the things i want to look for, don't make an important decision a choice when you are overcome by emotion. what does that mean demand have a you know the you are justified? unjustified. >> well, first of all, you never want to make a life choice when you are overcome with emotion. you want to be cognitively clear. the other thing, you want to know what you want to get out of every interaction. the strategic. when you are filled with emotions, you probably will not be sttategic. you want a quick fix, and that

often times will be counter to what you really want. melissa: wait until the next day . don't send that e-mail. save it and go to sleep and wait until the next day and look and make sure you still feel that way. but the second thing you mentioned, strategically identify what you really want. think, what is your goal and make sure that you can say it out loud. not to punish the spas and make them feel stupid, but what do i really want? this person's job, looking for a promotion, more money, respect? >> absolutely. you want to know will make your heart sang, what you want in the short term in the long term, and a trademarked the term career choreography. by halftime mean, there are a certain or is a certain set of logical steps that people can put together that will lead you to give what you want. you can happen out. you say their is a time and

place for everything and that every conversation, there is a right time to do it. also, visualize the most severe consequences that a bad emottonally charged jurors can have on the most miles of consequences that can,. >> that's being consequence. and if tiger woods, kobe bryant, david patraeus, arnold schwarzenegger had thought about the heinous consequences of their acts, they probably would not have done them. conversely, if you think about the most wonderful things that can take place by making a constructive, positive decision, those energy charges will lead you to make a great life decision. melissa: this is when you have personally told me and it has helped me so much on track to make decisions. you say, see things from their point of view which sells like something that you say to kids. you really mean to what is it that there after? understand where they're coming

from and see things from the other person's point of view. >> and it makes you not only highly strategic to do that, but you put your -- you put the percentages in your favor the you willsucceed. if you know what other people's expectations are, you can meet them, anticipate what's going to happen. you really want to do that. melissa: what i love about this book is it is about what to do work and how to get ahead, but the principals to be applied to almost anything, whether you're managing other people were your own family and their relationships. all of these things, the out, what you will say. dole lashed out. cool off before you do anything. all these lessons can be applied to almost any sort of conflict situation thatyou're trying to work out with the money related or not. >> absolutely. you can make a terrible personal decision just as easily as you make a terrible professional decision. i help people stop smoking, drinking, cursing, stop yelling

at their spouse, whenever it is, you can actually break up toxic scripting. melissa: i love the book. it's great. he is the masterind behind all the beautiful ladies you see here at fox. he is the guy. the advice. the sobering has a new gold standard. a olid gold shirt as the perfect thing. how much does that way? that's what i want to know. florida outdoes itself again. we to deal with the kids coming with the alligators. so fun. no of python hunting contest with a huge cash price is taking things to a whole new level. i want to hear this. you canever have too much money or too many pythons. ♪

melissa: you can hear. me to ask for a over a little bit of fun with spare change. check this out. an indian man with 200 30,000

dollars for a solid gold sure. the businessman ordered the 7-pound top for a new year's eve celebration. he said that he considered it an investment that will continue to appreciate. actually, you were annoyed with us or? >> actually i love it. i have a matching pants. [laughter] >> you know i heard part of why he did this was to attract the ladies. gerri: melissa: i'm not sure that's the kind of guy that you want to attract. >> there is a lot of blame.

melissa: do you think it's a good investment? >> it's crazy. it doesn't bode well for him as far as getting mugged is concerned. melissa: 400 people are locked in the everglades to hunt burmese pythons. you don't even have to have a hunting license to do that. it is all going to work out just ne. the month-long 2013 python challenge offers a reward for the longest python. $1000. i feel like it is worth more than that. possibly worth a gold shirt. [laughter] >> that's rit, you should get a gold shirt. >> this is like the movie jaws.

>> is a bad thing. to i guess they want to get everyone really junk day after day. [laughter] >> i'm a snake in that area, i'm heading for the hills. >> i don't think this is going to end well. >> if you don't need any background or expertise whatsoever, presumably there is a lot of them if they are trying to kl them. melissa: all right, the leader of north korea kim jong-un, is giving every child in the country a sweet treat. but here's the kicker. it was for his birthday. he carried on the tradition and thing 2 pounds of candy to every kid. even on the outlying islands.

we think about that? >> i think it's part of the brainwashing. >> here's your candy for my birthday. 2.2 pounds. i wonder how he came up with that. >> it sounds pretty suspect may. melissa: this one is pretty interesting. a male ceos wife has a baby and it can impact the salaries. if the baby is a girl, it raises the female ceos day. if it's a boy, it raises the male ceos.