Congressional Progressive Caucus Co-Chairs Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) and Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.) have proposed the Restore the American Dream for the 99% Act, a package of near-term job-creation measures and budgetary policy reforms that would meaningfully boost employment and improve the long-term fiscal outlook. This report examines the likely impact of several core elements of the package on job creation. In particular:
Enacting the Emergency Jobs to Restore the American Dream Act sponsored by Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) would boost employment by approximately 1.1 million jobs in each of fiscal years 2012 and 2013.1 Continuing the Emergency Unemployment Compensation program would boost employment by roughly 323,000 jobs in fiscal 2012 and 185,000 jobs in fiscal 2013. Reinstating the Making Work Pay tax credit for 2012 and 2013 would boost employment by 409,000 in fiscal 2012 and 532,000 jobs in fiscal 2013. Reinstating the higher Federal Medical Assistance Percentages (FMAP) used to determine federal reimbursement for state Medicaid programs would boost employment by 349,000 jobs in fiscal 2012.2 Increasing federal surface transportation investments by $50 billion in the next decade would increase employment by 47,000 jobs in fiscal 2012 and 112,000 jobs in fiscal 2013. Even greater employment gains would be achieved in later years. Defusing the automatic spending cuts currently scheduled under the Budget Control Act would boost employment by more than 1.1 million jobs in fiscal 2013.These major components of the Act for the 99% would increase nonfarm payroll employment by almost 2.3 million jobs in 2012 and almost 3.1 million jobs in 2013.