report" with tyler mathisen and susie gharib. funded in part by -- thestreet.com and action alerts plus where jim cramer and fellow portfolio manager stephanie link share their investment strategies, stock picks and market insights. you can learn more at thestreet.com/nbr. wall street and washington. the two intersected today when some of the biggest names in business from walmart to exxon mobile asked the president about some of the biggest issues facing their companies and the economy. >> and there's one matter that could keep business leaders up at night in the new year. we'll tell you what it is. all that and more tonight on "nightly business report" for wednesday, december 3rd. >> good evening, everyone. i'm sue herera.

susie gharib is off tonight. >> i'm tyler mathisen. welcome. modest gains for stocks today. enough to knock record closing for the dow and s&p 500. we do begin tonight with a meeting of the business round table. a collection of top chief executives from some of the nation's biggest companies. weighing in on matters important to the business and the economy. concerns like tumbling oil and gasoline prices, immigration reform. the gap in finding skilled workers, tax reform for businesses, and individuals and much more. they took their concerns straight to the president today to discuss ways washington and wall street could work together to create jobs and promote growth. but before those chief executives including the leaders of four out components. exxon and walmart talked to the president. they spoke to becky quinn. >> reporter: ceos gathering in washington today among the business round table. plummeting energy prices, a

skills gap leaving companies struggling to fill jobs and the nation's tax policy. >> this could be 84% growth economy if a few fundamental things are done in terms of tax reform and in terms of regulation and how we think about regulating business. i think we're all appear hence e i -- apprehensive to do a high five. >> sub 3% growth and a high percent of 3% growth. any economy in the world with 3% gdp growth, skilled trades for really skilled jobs for service technicians. it's hazard to find qualified people. >> reporter: to those falling energy prices. i asked the ceos of exxon and walmart how the sharp decline is impacting their businesses. >> it's not the first time we've been through a price correction. for younger people, it will be

their first experience to go through a commodity price correction. it's a return to fundamentals for us. it's important about watching your cash, watching your investment decisions. being very disciplined about everything and looking for opportunities that may present themselves in an environment like this. >> i don't think there's any doubt that low fuel prices help retail and helping us in particular. it's a bit of a tailwind. when i got here yesterday, rex from exxon said, i haven't got your thank you note for low fuel price. it helps. it's important to remember for us in the u.s., we serve the u.s. demographic. our customer base looks like the bell curve of the u.s. from the income point of view. we have an important middle income business and we do have customers who still pay in cash. about 25% of our transactions are still done in cash. it's that customer in particular if it went into the gas tank, it wouldn't be spent on some item in our store. >> reporter: the most common word by ceos, "okay." not great or bad, but okay.

for "nightly business report," i'm becky quick. >> those same ceos and many others got to hear from president obama and participate in a rare question and answer session delving deeper into concerns about wage gape. eamon javers has more. >> hope sales are good. >> reporter: president obama met with top business leaders to deliver a message that the u.s. economy is strong and took a moment to encourage them to boost worker pay. >> unfortunately, the overall trend lines have been even as productively and profits go up, wages and incomes as a shared overall gep have shrunk. that's part of what is creating an undertow of pessimism despite generally good economic news. >> reporter: the president also pushed back on business complaints that washington regulations are holding them

back. >> about 25% right when it comes to regulatory burden. >> reporter: with so many global ceos for the business round table meeting, it was a day the business community told washington what it wants for the nation's capital. >> if we want the capital invested in the u.s., and regulation, the cost of regulation is a big concern with people. >> i think there's a realistic probability of some sort of tax reform. it's going to take a while. i think the concept would be have to be revenue neutral. if you have that concept, it's revenue neutral, some companies have to accept they're not going to get some of the tax deductions they previously get. >> reporter: but despite that, what we didn't see today is the sometimes confrontation

undertone in the white house of the presidency. these two groups clearly worked together. for "nightly business report," i'm eamon javers in washington. positive news on the job front. medicare and medicaid services, health care spending in the u.s. grew at the lowest rate ever recorded last year. some companies could face legal headaches. >> reporter: could use incentives to work and charge more to those who opt out. >> if they don't get the survey, pay a hundred more for their coverage. why should people who don't care

about how they're living, why should they be able to take advantage of all the people who do care? >> reporter: living under the americans with disabilities act requiring a medical screening and then punishing people for not getting one is discriminatory. that's why the equal employment opportunity commission has sued. some analysts see more lawsuits ahead with the so-called employer mandate going into effect in january requiring large firms to provide insurance for workers who put in 30 hours a week. under the aca, workers could sue if they lose coverage. employers haven't been focused on those risks in the law but plaintiff's lawyers have and looking to line up aggrieved workers. >> there's thousands of pages of regulations and they're going to look through the regulations and statutes and come up with novel causes of action. we started to see that already. >> reporter: it's not just private companies.

municipalities with unionized workers, teachers, firefighters could find themselves in conflicting parts of the law. >> could intensify next year as employers try to cut back on benefits of the rich union plans in order to avoid one penalty of the aca, the so-called catlact. bertha coombs, "nightly business report" in new york. more on the close in the dow and s&p with jobs and worker productivity which grew at a faster than forecast pace at 2 and 1/3%. the nasdaq added 18 and the s&p was up by 7. stocks up. today, another top fed repeated

his call to raise benchmark interest rates too and do it soon. charles plaser said keeping rates near 15% near the central banks goal is too risky and said it's time the fed moves towards lifting short-term ranks. the federal reserve's final beige book survey of the year was released today and its outlook was a bit more upbeat than past readings. that's good news ahead of the november jobs report. steve liesman has more. >> reporter: the fed's beige book, from the 12 federal reserve throughout the country backed up recent strong economic reports. the economy is in good shape. not great, it's good. it's rodney dangerfield economy.

hasn't gotten a lot of respect. >> reporter: improved in that retailers on holiday sale and would help consumers out when they went to stores for the holiday shopping season. the main negative? real estate sales rose in half the country and home prices little changed. beyond housing, other economic data has been upbeat. a key report on the service sector hit the second highest level since the financial crisis with gains in new orders and exports. auto sales topped the 17 million mark for the second time since 2006 and the adp jumps came in a touch below expectations but still suggestive that private sector growth remains strong at $208,0 $208,000. 230,000 jobs created in november and unemployment rates up changed at 5.8%. that will create the jobs in the u.s. economy to show these

strong economic numbers are showing up in more american paychecks. for "nightly business report," i'm steve liesman. mo >> more in the jobs number. what would alarm you on the downside if the number doesn't come in quite as high as forecasted? >> we're looking for 230,000 jobs added in november. close to the average we've seen so far in 2014. if it was below 200,000, i'd be a little bit concerned. that's slower than the pace we've seen this year. overall, it looks like the economy is adding jobs at a decent clip and the job growth is across industry. that's a positive as well. >> gus, one worry is the people who have been out of work for a long period of time and are discouraged workers and they don't show up on the rolls at all and there are those who say

that's quite a large portion of parts of the population. does that concern you? >> it does. we have seen the labor force participate, working or looking for work to stabilize but still near a 40 year low. i think there are a lot of people on the sidelines who would come back in as the labor market gets stronger. i think we will see that but it hasn't been as strong as we'd like to see. as wage growth picks up, we'll see some of the people come back into the labor force. >> we had the report a moment ago from bertha coombs on the affordable care act, some felt that law could restrain hiring or depress it. some provisions have not kicked in yet. more will next year. have you seen evidence that businesses held back on hiring as a result of the aca?

>> we've seen anecdotal evidence but aggregate numbers look pretty good. we see businesses moving workers from part-time to full-time status. there was a concern they were holding off because of the concerns about the aca. at a macro level, we haven't seen businesses reluctant to hire because of the aca. could be more prominent in 2015 as mandates kick in, however. >> let me turn to the data we got today. what does it tell you about where we are in the economic recovery? we're not quite as expansion, certainly, in some cases in some parts of that data but has been pretty decent recently. >> definitely. things look stronger. bad winter in 2014 that affected many parts of the country but since then, 3% at an annual pace. investment and housing market is slow but picking up.

a lot of industries adding jobs. we even have government adding the jobs which wasn't the case for a number of years. we have an economy that's firing on most if not all cylinders at this point and i think that's why things have looked better in the last half of 2014. >> very quickly, what does low oil price mean for the u.s. economy? >> on the whole, it's a positive. it means consumers have more money to spend on christmas preside presents and more for businesses to invest. >> gus boucher with pnc financial> financ still ahead, air bag recall nationwide. details ahead.

new legal challenge. president obama's executive order aimed at easing the threat of deportation for 5 million undocumented workers here, immigrations in the u.s. texas leading a 17 state coalition suing the administration saying the president doesn't have the authority to rewrite immigration laws and that the order was a reward for people who break current u.s. policies. two major auto makers are expanding the recalls of cars with potentially defective driver's side air bags takata corporation. chrysler adding pickups in a handful of southern states. earlier today, honda expanded its current recall to all 50 states. at a hearing on capitol hill, an executive from honda said the

company will prize recalls in high humidity areas. >> why are we doing this? our customers have concerns and we want to address them. we believe this expansion and acceleration of current action. we believe there will be a part shortage that may occur, despite taka takata's efforts to decrease the inflaters. >> honda is working with other air bag manufacturers as well. five deaths attributed to takata's air bags and could explode sending metal shrapnel into the car's compartment. they said the demand isn't supported by the evidence. the teen retailer managed to post earnings and beat estimates.

last year's full profit forecast saying it expects retail conditions to remain difficult. despite all of that, shares rose almost 3.5% to $23.81. announced closing 75 stores in the quarter. tumbled in afterhours trading. this is the company's eighth consecutive quarterly loss. you can see the stock really plummeting after hours. before the close, shares up 4% to $3.19. round foreman, the jack daniels missed wall street forecast that made the results even harder for investors to swallow but go down better with a little jack daniels, i suppose. $3.75 to $92.25.

j 2 global decided to buy the back-up company it doesn't own valuing at $15 a share. carbnite saw it urge 43% to $14.44 and up 6% in $60.33. johnson and johnson hired goldman sachs to explore a sale of its splenda brand according to reports. selling the artificial sweetener would allow them to leave the business because of weak soft drink sales and shares down slightly to $107.72. kraft foods hiking the price of the k cups for the first time. maxwell house coffee blamed higher commodity costs saying 5% higher starting november 28. hershey is considering ditching high fructose corn syrup in some of its products.

the consumers prefer sugar. amid concerns that corn syrup is more unhealthy. some of the products affected are almond joy and york peppermint patties. shares down slightly. 12 cents a share paid to shareholders at the end of march. these special ty. $21.54. the packages being shipped and getting a box where it needs to go is a very complex high-tech process. you can't believe the conveyor belts you're about to see. take you along the ride next.

are you watching more or less tv these days and are you watching those shows on new devices? the ratings company nielson said the traditional tv viewing like broadcast or cable television fell by 4% in the third quarter of year. streaming of tv shows and movies through netflix or amazon prize shot up by astounding 60% and there was a big jump in viewer ship on smartphones and tablets. no pressure here but 21 days until christmas and shippers like fedex are working hard to avoid last year's massive delivery delays caused by wicked weather and too many late orders. we followed the shipping route for one holiday gift box to see just how complex that process really is. morgan brennan has more from

washington. >> reporter: for fedex, this is the most important time of the year. parcel carrier expected to ship a record 96 million packages this holiday season and do so while preventing a repeat of last christmas. when some gifts didn't make their shipping deadline. we got a behind the scenes look at fedex's express operation. shipping a package of wine across country overnight delivery. >> that's a particular bottle that currently retails almost $4,000. >> reporter: first off, picking the wine. as you can see, there's a lot to choose from. the journey started tuesday at wine.com's distribution facility in berkeley, california. we settled on four boltles from california carefully packed up to get them there safely. our wine in this box is ready for 2,800 mile journey cross country overnight. off to fedex in oakland where it hits its first round of sorting. >> it goes through our automated sort and our out bound priority

overnight flight. >> reporter: this facility is busy but nothing compared to the next stop. memph memphis. middle of the night but no sleeping here as our cargo as fedex's biggest sorting hub. this is known as the matrix. millions of packages a day. most fedex express shipments pass through here including hours. eastbound to virginia from tarmac to truck in under an hour on to the nation's capital for the third and final sort. here it is and at least from the outside in one piece. now loaded on to the delivery truck, wine goes to its final destination. cnbc's dc office. from weather to logistics, many factors need to go right in the package. 15 meteorologists and invested billions of dollars over the last several years into ensuring that entire process goes according to plan. today? at least for our precious cargo, it did.

for "nightly business report," i'm morgan brennan, washington, d.c. >> i wonder what she's going to do with that. >> hmm. >> the price of oil may be higher today and fall at the pump. regular gas sells under 2 a gallon. where? oklahoma city. >> wow. and finally tonight, a real surprise in the coveted pick for truck of the year at motor trend magazine. the mid sized 2015 chevy colorado and not the redesigned aluminum bodied ford f-150 pickup. which hits stores this month. cutting pounds from the truck but simply, quote, wasn't best in class and the chevy truck was. fancy that. that will do it for "nightly business report" tonight. i'm sue herera in for susie

gharib. >> i'm tyler mathisen. on behalf of your station, thank you for being here and we'll see you back here tomorrow night. "nightly business report" has been funded in part by -- thestreet.com and action alerts plus where jim cramer and fellow portfolio manager stephanie link share their investment strategies, stock picks and market insights. you can learn more at thestreet.com/nbr.

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