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Published January 24, 2017
DISCLAIMER: THE FOLLOWING "Cost of Freedom Recap" CONTAINS STRONG OPINIONS WHICH ARE NOT A REFLECTION OF THE OPINIONS OF FOX NEWS AND SHOULD NOT BE RELIED UPON AS INVESTMENT ADVICE WHEN MAKING PERSONAL INVESTMENT DECISIONS. IT IS FOX NEWS' POLICY THAT CONTRIBUTORS DISCLOSE POSITIONS THEY HOLD IN STOCKS THEY DISCUSS, THOUGH POSITIONS MAY CHANGE. READERS OF "Cost of Freedom Recap" MUST TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR OWN INVESTMENT DECISIONS.
Walmart warns wage hikes are cutting into profits
Scott Martin: In Walmart’s case and the tune of $1.2 Billion and that's just the tip of the iceberg. We're seeing it affecting the profits and earnings. Did you see this and they will start to impact smaller businesses and start laying off. This is go have destructive affects overall.
Nomi Konst: They're known for the low wages and keeping the employees hours down, and that putting them on government on $2.6 Billion a year. That's our tax dollars pay for the employees that are below the full time hours. When i don't you look at it.
Gary B. Smith: I am glad that she feels that she can go in on Walmart’s business models and one of the greatest wealth creators in the united states. So they do not know thousand business works. This is how it works. That one dollar an hour wage increase for the Walmart impacts and cuts the net income 37 percent because most of their stuff after they buy the goods is employee and people on the floor are selling. That's how much of a cut it takes. That money just does not -- it's not like I can't join this country club. The way that it works is that that money comes out of retained earnings. What is that used for? It's used to build more Walmart stores and higher more employees. Yeah, maybe the people get more and the future growth of the companies like Walmart or apple or google is impacted by the wages and it ends up hurting the economy. The left needs to learn that there's no free lunch. There is. Everything should be for tree free, and it's not the case.
Suzy Welch: I think that there are a couple of different things going on at the same time. It's the Walmart executives were going to answer the questions they would shake the heads and say no no no. The business model is under assault. I don’t want to blame Walmart for it and they employ 2 million people. It's under assault and they're carrying a ton of real-estate and that's going to cause a gigantic shake out, and i think that people are going to take a hit and sadly are the employees, the only flexibility that they have is to cut people.
Jonas Max Ferris: Let's pretend that there's a sales. I can't think of a company that's better approximate positioned as Walmart. We may see higher employment rates and this is on squeezing the supply chain to get the lowest prices. If everybody pays it, then the lowest prices are at Walmart. Everybody is going flood too and now prices are going up and then the consumer and what is hurting Walmart right now is that they have too much money from the falling gas prices and stepping up to the better stores and read between the lines and Walmart benefits from the consumer when the nails are screwed over by the government raising prices. I see them benefits but consumers losing.
Iran's ballistic missile test raising questions about new nuke deal
Suzy Welch: I have no idea. I mean there's one word that comes to mind and it's humiliating and it's the second word predictable. There are three audiences for the illegal display for Iran. The message is nah-nah and then the second Israel saying be afraid and then Russia saying are you good. I think that it's the whole thing shows that the deal the new deal that we're going to sign is a display of gullibility and weakness.
Nomi Konst: I love the humor there. The deal is not in place. We do have the inspectors there. Under the new deal the number one thing that makes me support the deal is that we have inspectors on the ground and tracking the every move. If we don't have a deal, we don't have this. We have 90 other countries endorsing it. What are we supposed to do at this point. It's done and it's the best thing that's happened with Iran at this point opposed to nothing. What is the alternative not having the inspectors?
Gary B. Smith: No matter what they do, why do we think that a country whose motto is going to say you know what, we could be friends and have a deal out there. Look, they're going to be about as duplicitous, I guess that's a word, as any other country out there and north Korea they're going to put in the face and work around the field to make us work bad and get the hands on it, and it's going to destroy us. If we want that, go ahead forward with the deal.
Jonas Max Ferris: Isn't it possible that they let the video out to kill the deal and everybody in Iran and look. It was built on something like improvement. Just little small improvements and you have the best in the world. With that sad, it's possible that this deal is slightly better than the current situation. There's no good situation in the Middle East. Others can and then cannot get nuclear weapons in the country and it's not going work out. There is no easy solution and there are bad people there and good things. There's no great way out of this. Anything that might slow down and the nuclear weapon is probably better.
Scott Martin: We don't have the inspectors there. They're not going to have free range. They're not going to go in the tunnels and check out the factories. No way. Number two is opening the door for Vlady Putin to walk right into Syria too. This is destabilizing the area and not helping anything.
Glitch knocks out Homeland Security airport system, causes massive delays
Suzy Welch: Yeah, it does not seem like that and then the impression that we really do have great people and this is actually whether that's true or not, we don't know. This is a battle of the brains and I am concerned that the U.S. Government are not getting the best, and we talk about the horrific outcome and there's a complexity. One of the really bad outcomes along with the deaths is that if the travels go down and if this continues on that's the global economy, and so it's the pile upon piles of bad news if we don't get the best brains of the game.
Gary B. Smith: Look she talked about the brains. The best way to do that is privatize it. It's like that's wacky. Well, they should love this. They privatize all of the security and screening at the airports. That way you get the innovation and you get efficiency like you do with the private enterprise. You go public and throw big government and throw up a big problem, this is what you get.
Nomi Konst: I don't know what left would love that. Listen the companies and government and everybody is vulnerable. It was just announced today that Russia hacked into the government again. This is happening every single day, and we do need the brightest minds. We cannot use them for the government, and we have to compete with the Facebooks and Twitters that cannot keep up with the security. You're totally right Suzy. This is a congress sequence and every time there's a glitch, there's someone that miss a job interview. It affects the economy every single day.
Jonas Max Ferris: They do the development to the companies and the problem is the very best talent is not with those companies and they're figuring out ways to track the groceries and that's the best development and not tracking the terrorists. We have to see a way to get the talent in a way and the jobs do not have the sock options.
Scott Martin: Yeah, that's what you can do. You can get the government to partner up with the tech land and they clearly need help and everybody wants us to be safe and protected.
Predictions
Scott Martin: Kraft (KHC) 20% in a year
Jonas Max Ferris: McDonalds (MCD) 15% in a year
Gary B. Smith: Walmart (WMT) 30% profit in a year
https://www.foxnews.com/transcript/new-sign-wage-hikes-may-be-impacting-corporate-profits-jobs