Washington Business Fall 2016 | Washington Business | Page 48

business backgrounder | economy

Using data from the Peterson Institute for International Economics,
the U.S. International Trade Commission, industry interviews and other
sources, the study forecasts what the Washington economy would look
like today if the TPP had been fully enacted by 2015. (The TPP hasn’t
yet been ratified by Congress; it was finalized and signed by the dozen
participating countries in February of 2016.)
If the TPP had been fully in force, Washington’s exports would have
been between $2 billion and $8.7 billion higher than actual 2015 totals.
Those gains would translate to more jobs for Washington workers:
anywhere between 5,900 and 26,400 additional direct jobs, according to
the analysis.
Those jobs would ripple through the economy, creating new work
for others, meaning that the TPP would create anywhere from 16,500 to
73,200 new jobs in Washington.
The TPP will be good for Washington’s economy, according to the
study — and according to the U.S. Secretary of the Interior, it will also be
good for the planet.
“We can have both conservation and development. The two are not in
conflict,” said Sally Jewell, the former CEO of REI who now leads the U.S.
Department of the Interior. “We will be better off environmentally and
will give people jobs at home through the TPP.”
Speaking in July to 200 business leaders during a visit to Seattle, Jewell
said the TPP’s high standards will ensure that America’s trading partners
adhere to the same high environmental and labor standards as employers
in the United States.

48 association of washington business

“We can have both conservation and
development. The two are not in conflict...
We will be better off environmentally and
will give people jobs at home through
the TPP.”
— Sally Jewell, U.S. Secretary of the Interior