At nearly every door of the thousands Working America canvassers knock on every week, there’s one issue that comes first, last and in between: jobs.

In states like Pennsylvania, Ohio and New Mexico, the crisis of joblessness is the most important issue from everyone we talk to. They want more support for the unemployed and more opportunities to put people back to work. The message from the neighborhoods we visit: before we can tackle any other issue facing us, we have to put paychecks back in people’s pockets. These folks are particularly interested in President Obama’s recently-proposed American Jobs Act.

The consensus among economists is that, if passed, the American Jobs Act could pull us away from continued recession and help put people back to work. That’s according to a new survey from Bloomberg News.

The bill is, as we’ve said, a good start—not a magic wand, just a few simple, common-sense proposals to help businesses create jobs, prevent state layoffs and put a little extra money in working people’s pockets.

Of course, the optimism people have when they talk about the President’s jobs plan is tempered by frustration and skepticism over whether Congress will actually listen to voters and bother to pass it. After the new House majority won on a promise to focus on jobs, they set the issue aside to focus on ideological and economically-illiterate crusades over spending and regulation. Passage of the American Jobs Act is in doubt, even as our members and the people we talk to are looking for action.

“The important thing to consider is: What happens if we don’t do anything?” asked Scott Brown, one of the economists surveyed by Bloomberg. It’s a good question, and one that people across the country are wondering even as Congress fails to act.