A study released in March 2009 concluded that the Port of Seattle generates over 111,000 jobs in the King County area.

Those jobs are in businesses that exist because passengers and cargo move through SeaTac and Elliot Bay. That makes the port one of our region’s largest job generators. Now, the port itself isn’t employing 111,000 people; it only has about 1,700 people on payroll, but even if you only counted the jobs directly related to Fisherman’s Terminal, cruise ships, SeaTac and our sea container yards, you’d still count over 40,000 people who owe their jobs to port facilities and operations.

The study documents billions of dollar in port-induced payroll moving through King County and calculates that port operations generate over $800 million in state and local taxes.

Our port is a job generating engine. In economic times like these it is even more critical we keep this engine running efficiently and for all our benefit.