Yesterday, we posted the latest segment from Paul's Making Sen$e series. In it, he spoke to two very distinct groups -- laid-off white collar executives and ex-cons looking for work -- and was struck by what he heard from both groups: that staying positive in the face of constant rejection is the key to succeeding in this extraordinarily difficult job market.

Today, we'd like to feature a few extended clips from the discussion with former executives in the Chicago suburb of Bolingbrook. Many have been out of work for months, and a few have been looking for jobs since the beginning of 2008.

Barbara Tomczak, a former human resources executive, has been looking for a new position for over a year. What struck us was her discussion of how HR execs often use salary ranges that job applicants plug in to online applications as a means to winnow the field.

And since we posted the resumes of the group of ex-convicts we spoke to in Chicago, we thought it only fair to also post the resumes of the out-of-work executives. We were also able to film them making short introductions about their past work experiences and how long they've been searching for work.

Resumes: Chris DeMaio, John Frech, John Kessberger, John Leone, John Lopata, Peter Sturdivant, Bharath Tolappa, Barbara Tomczak.

Question: During a recent story about the demise of the auto industry, there was clip of a Model T Ford driving through the Ford Museum. The narration made the point that one of the things that made Henry Ford successful was that he intentionally built a car that the workers in his factory could afford to buy.

That got me to thinking about recent trends in the current economy. Increasingly, it seems, people are employed making goods and providing services they themselves cannot afford.

We move manufacturing facilities offshore in search of cheap labor, and some companies move them from country to country as living standards rise overseas. In many cases, the workers there will likely never be in a position to purchase the products they help make.

Even in this country, many service economy jobs (e.g. at high-end hotels and restaurants) are filled by people who could not afford to be customers of those establishments.

What's worrisome is not that this occurs, but that it appears to occur more often than in the past. Have we really reversed the trend that Henry Ford started? If we push an ever larger portion of the country into underemployment, is it even possible to have a consumer-driven economy?

Being able to produce a shoe or a shirt or a car at a lower cost with a higher margin, doesn't help if there's nobody able to purchase the product. What tools do economists have to help decide what's "efficient" from a "systems" perspective?

We need a discussion about optimizing the results for the country, and since we're too far down the globalization path to stop, we need to think about optimizing the results for the planet. Where do we start?

Paul Solman: One place to start, at the moment, is Ellen Shell's book Cheap, which makes your point quite explicitly. Her basic thesis, in fact, is that by "saving money" on cheap goods and services, we may wind up paying more in the end. And she uses your example: Henry Ford paying his workers an at-the-time-unheard-of wage so that they could afford the cars they produced. "Fordism," this approach has been dubbed, and it is often pointed to as the alternative to the discount "race to the bottom."

Another starting point might be a Harvard inequality project that political science professor Bob (Bowling Alone) Putnam helps lead. He and fellow researchers blame the financial crisis, in part, on the well-documented economic split between the haves and have-nots (or, as President Bush II put it, the haves and have-mores). The logic: The greater the inequality, the less money the bottoms have to spend on goods and services provided by the tops. So what makes sense? The tops lend to the bottoms, and "make their money" thus. And again, everyone winds up worse off than they otherwise might be when the bottoms can't pay their debts.

Inequality is also bad for our collective health, which brings with it various costs to the society as a whole. See our piece with British epidemiologist Michael Marmot for the argument.

The problem, of course, is what to DO about inequality -- how to mitigate it. Here, the progressive consumption tax of Bob Frank is thought-provoking. A brief write-up of the idea, from Frank, appeared on this page last month.

Robert Frank: A British reader posted the following query on my UK publisher's web site: "Why do tube drivers get paid so much more than bus drivers?"

An American economist trying to field questions about markets in the UK operates at an obvious handicap. Market outcomes hinge on myriad facts on the ground, and having never lived in England, I'll often be completely ignorant of many of the most relevant ones. But since the spirit of the economic naturalist exercise is to come up with plausible hypotheses suitable for further testing, I'll forge ahead, taking inspiration from the retired American tennis legend Jimmy Connors.

If Connors had a glaring weakness, it was his serve. Even his first serve would be considered a weak second serve by the standards of today's men's game. Connors knew it wasn't an offensive weapon, so he just rolled it in, hoping that good things would happen once the point got under way. And that strategy worked well enough. I'll try a similar one here.

I have no idea why tube operators earn more than bus drivers. But the general question of why some jobs pay better than others is one that economists have studied extensively. So I'll make a few general observations about some of the most important sources of wage differentials and invite others to share their views.

The price of labor, like the price any good or service, is determined by the interplay of supply and demand. On the demand side, the employer's rule of thumb is to hire an additional worker if that worker will generate at least enough extra revenue to cover his salary. On the supply side, the worker must decide whether accepting a particular job at a given wage would be at least as attractive as any other available alternative, including the option of not working at all. These general observations suggest several possible explanations for wage differentials between seemingly similar jobs.

One is that potential employees may regard working conditions as less attractive in one job than the other. In that case, the first job would have to pay more or else no one would choose it. For example, when all other relevant factors are equal, risky jobs tend to pay more than safe ones.

But the higher wage for tube operators is unlikely to reflect compensation for risk, since driving a bus is actually much more risky. Many studies, for example, document the stress-related health problems that are common among bus drivers whose routes entail heavy urban traffic. If the observed wage differential is rooted in some difference in working conditions, a more promising candidate might be that jobs in dark underground spaces are considered generally less attractive than those that can be performed in broad daylight.

Another possibility is that for every job opening in each category, there are fewer potential candidates qualified to be tube operators than there are to be bus drivers. This explanation also sounds promising, since most people who can drive a car could be trained to drive a bus relatively quickly. A final possibility I'll mention is that wages would tend to be higher for tube operators if for some reason they were represented by a stronger union. I look forward to hearing your thoughts about which, if any, of these possibilities seems most promising.

Robert Frank's latest book, The Economic Naturalist's Field Guide: Common Sense Principles for Troubled Times, was published last month.

On last night's NewsHour, Paul Solman got some perspective on the difficult job market from two very distinct groups: former executives and former prison inmates.

What was striking when he met with the two groups of job seekers was just how similar their psychological struggle can be in this extraordinarily difficult market. Both groups spoke of the difficulty in staying positive in the face of constant rejection, and how they hope that successfully battling that discouragement will put them back on the path to employment.

When Paul was interviewing the group of ex-convicts in the job search program at Chicago's Safer Foundation, one asked, perhaps jokingly, if we might post their resumes on the web. But we take all jokes seriously and thought this a particularly interesting idea. We, at least, were interested in their resumes and thought you might be too. We'll post resumes from the group of former executives, plus extended interviews with them, tomorrow.

Resumes: Marcus Adams, Dimitrious Johnson, Philip Turner, and Cephas Wright.

Robert Frank: Why does the public transport system in London charge significantly more for a tube or bus journey if you buy a paper ticket than it does if you use their Oyster prepaid card?

In most cities around the globe, the price of an urban transit ride depends on how you pay for it. In London, for example, the 2007 cash price of a single tube ride was 4 pounds, but if you bought a prepaid Oyster Card, the same journey would cost you only 1.50 pounds. Similarly, the cash price of a single bus ride in London was 2 pounds in 2007, while the same ride with an Oyster Card was only 0.90 pounds. Why do travelers pay less than half as much with an Oyster Card?

Because ticket revenues in urban transit systems generally fall short of covering total system costs, operators are constantly on the lookout for ways to boost their receipts. Relative to the alternative of charging the same price to all travelers, a seller can generally generate substantially more revenue by charging high prices to those who are willing to pay them, while offering discounts to those who would be unwilling to buy without them.

The Oyster Card is a simple hurdle that helps segregate buyers in this way. The hurdle buyers must jump in this case is exceedingly simple: They must fill in a form and buy a card in advance, which they can do either online or in person at any tube stop. Transport for London knows that those who are unwilling to clear even this simple hurdle can hardly be very sensitive to price, and hence the relatively steep cash fare of 4 pounds per ride. Had Transport for London charged everyone that much, it would have lost most of its travelers. But by offering the Oyster Card option, it keeps the system affordable for its price-sensitive travelers, while collecting a substantial premium from about 20 percent of its travelers.

Robert Frank's latest book, The Economic Naturalist's Field Guide: Common Sense Principles for Troubled Times, was published last month.

Paul Solman: Sometimes described as a "centrist" Democrat, Congressman Eric Massa, a former Republican, represents a district of New York state that includes Rochester. Recently, this press release of his came our way.

Since part of what we're trying to do with the Business Desk is make it a place for the wisest economists I know to weigh in on hot issues, I sent Massa's "Why I Voted 'No' on the Cap & Trade Bill" to Harvard environmental economist Rob Stavins, whose commentary on cap & trade I've been reading assiduously of late. His comments are in CAPS below, and his recent posts are linked near the end.

Press Release from the office of Rep. Eric Massa:

Subject: Why I Voted "No" on the Cap & Trade Bill

On Friday, June 26th, the 111th Congress voted on, and passed the Cap & Trade Climate Bill (H.R. 2454). I did not vote for it, and as my constituents and supporters, you have the right to know why.

Let me first start off by saying that I believe that global climate change is real, and that man and the industrial activities of man are largely to blame for it. I also believe that as a Congress and as a people it is imperative that we act to address this crisis, and that we act sooner rather than later. That said, I do not believe that this Bill is the right solution to the problems that we are facing. I stood opposed to this Bill for four primary reasons.

1) This plan, as it is designed, presents the potential for new energy costs with unproven positive results. During this recession I cannot support a plan that will raise costs for American families, and I think we should be focusing on investing in the clean technologies of the future that do hold promising outcomes. Hydrogen Fuel Cell technology is one of these solutions, however there is much to do to place this technology in the research and development portfolio. This is a step in the wrong direction.

Robert Stavins: COSTS WILL NOT OCCUR DURING THE RECESSION. THE BILL'S MANDATES WOULD BEGIN IN 2012, AND WOULD NOT BEGIN TO REALLY BITE UNTIL 2016. SO, ANY TALK ABOUT THE RECESSION IS A RED HERRING. IN ANY EVENT, HOW "INVESTING IN CLEAN TECHNOLOGIES" WOULD BE COSTLESS IS BEYOND ME.

2) I am deeply concerned about the potentially negative impact of the Cap and Trade system on major companies in my district which would likely encounter difficulties acquiring the "carbon credits" necessary to do business. This will force our companies to make investments in foreign offsets like purchasing rainforest lands.

Robert Stavins: ANOTHER RED HERRING. FOR THOSE FEW SECTORS THAT ARE BOTH ENERGY-INTENSIVE AND TRADE-SENSITIVE (CEMENT, ROLLED STEEL, ALUMINUM, BULK GLASS, PAPER, FOSSIL FUELS), THE BILL PROVIDES VERY STRONG SUPPORTS TO ADDRESS CONCERNS ABOUT INTERNATIONAL COMPETITIVENESS: IN THE SHORT TERM, AN OUTPUT-BASED UPDATING ALLOWANCE ALLOCATION MECHANISM, AND IN THE LONG-TERM A REQUIREMENT THAT IMPORTS OF THESE COMMODITIES FROM COUNTRIES WITHOUT COMPARABLE CLIMATE POLICIES MUST HOLD EQUIVALENT NUMBERS OF ALLOWANCES.

However, much like the banking bailout, I fear there will not be enough oversight into how these funds are spent overseas by foreign governments. I disagree with a plan that puts in place hundreds of billions of dollars of foreign offsets, which will drain American funds to corrupt overseas Governments where there is little or no oversight to ensure that the funds will be used for the actual planting of trees or rebuilding of tropical forests.

Robert Stavins: I REALLY DON'T KNOW WHERE THE "HUNDREDS OF BILLIONS OF DOLLARS" COMES FROM. IN FACT, THE BILL ALLOCATES 5 PERCENT OF ALLOWANCES TO PREVENTING TROPICAL DEFORESTATION FROM 2012 THROUGH 2025, FROM 2026 THROUGH 2030 THIS DROPS TO 3 PERCENT, AND IN 2031 AND THEREAFTER THE ALLOCATION IS 2 PERCENT OF ALLOWANCES. RETARDING DEFORESTATION IN TROPICAL AREAS IS AN IMPORTANT AND COST-EFFECTIVE MEANS OF ACHIEVING EMISSIONS REDUCTIONS, AND SAVES MONEY FOR AMERICAN BUSINESSES.

3) I strongly disagree with the process by which Congress was forced to take this vote. This bill did not stop changing until 3 AM on the night before the vote when a 300-page amendment was added. I did not feel there was enough time to research, review, and fully digest the contents of this massive bill. With so much at stake, rushing the vote was unacceptable to me.

Robert Stavins: I ALSO DID NOT LIKE THE 3 AM PROCESS OR -- MORE IMPORTANTLY -- THE SUBSTANCE OF SOME OF THE 3 AM AMENDMENTS, BUT THE FINAL BILL -- WITH ALL ITS FLAWS -- REMAINS A SOLID FOUNDATION FOR MOVING ON TO THE SENATE. ON THIS, PLEASE READ MY THREE MOST RECENT POSTS AT MY BLOG, AN ECONOMIC VIEW OF THE ENVIRONMENT.

4) My final reason for opposing this bill was you, the constituents of New York's 29th Congressional District. In the week leading up to the vote, our offices received hundreds of phone calls urging a 'no' vote. In fact, after we tallied the responses, the "vote no" calls outnumbered the "vote yes" calls by a ratio of 19 to 1. My job is to represent you, and that's exactly what I did in casting my vote. While voting based only on polling data is not in concert with my vision - representing this District is my job and I take your concerns very seriously.

Robert Stavins: OK, THE CONGRESSMAN CHOSE TO FOLLOW THE POLITICAL WINDS.

Now the conversation must move forward. I stand fully committed to crafting and implementing solutions that will move us in the right direction on this issue, and I hope you will work along side me as we do the hard work that is required. There will certainly be times when you disagree with my votes or my stances on issues, but as your Representative in Washington, I will always level with you and tell the truth. I believe that open and honest dialogue should be the norm, and I welcome your input, your opinions, and your expertise as we work through the countless issues that come before Congress. Thank you for taking the time to read this email, and please know that I am no one's Congressman but your Congressman, and I thank you for your support.

Very Respectfully,

Eric Massa

Whether it's tackling why brides buy outfits and grooms rent to explaining why drive-up ATMs have Braille dots and freezers don't have lights, Robert Frank has been guest blogging fascinating answers to the world's economic ironies for the past week.

Now, it's your turn to send him your most vexing and befuddling questions about the economic world. He's addressed questions from his students and readers in the past such as:

Why did kamikaze pilots wear helmets?

Why do brown eggs cost more than white ones?

Leave your questions in the comments or in the question box to the right and Robert Frank will address them soon right here.