Stuart Alderoty is using an estimated 232,000 crypto-related jobs to make the case for the CLARITY Act as the Senate prepares for a key procedural vote.
Ripple Chief Legal Officer and National Cryptocurrency Association (NCA) President Stuart Alderoty has urged senators to back the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act before the Senate’s September 15 cloture vote.
The argument draws on an NCA-funded study that estimates the crypto industry directly supports around 34,000 full-time-equivalent jobs in the U.S. Including indirect and induced employment, the report puts the sector’s total economic job footprint at approximately 232,000 positions.
The Senate is scheduled to vote on cloture for H.R. 3633 at 2:15 p.m. Eastern on September 15. The vote is a procedural step that would allow senators to begin formally considering the legislation; it does not determine whether the CLARITY Act will ultimately pass.
The 232,000 figure is being presented as part of the political argument for regulatory clarity. However, it represents the industry’s estimated existing economic footprint rather than jobs that would be created by the legislation. That distinction matters because Senate Republicans need Democratic votes to reach the 60-vote threshold required to advance the bill.
CLARITY Act Faces Key Senate Test
The House approved the CLARITY Act by a 294-134 vote on July 17, 2025, including support from 78 Democrats. The Senate Banking Committee subsequently advanced a revised version in May 2026 by a 15-9 vote, with Democratic Senators Ruben Gallego and Angela Alsobrooks joining Republicans.
The Senate’s September 15 motion to proceed requires 60 votes, leaving Republicans reliant on Democratic backing to move forward.
The legislation also faces differences between the House and Senate versions. Since the Senate amended the House bill, lawmakers in both chambers will eventually need to settle on identical language before it can reach the president. Questions surrounding ethics provisions and stablecoin regulation remain unresolved.
Kalshi currently gives the CLARITY Act a 45% chance of becoming law before October 1, 2027. The probability has fallen by seven percentage points, but the market continues to treat the September 15 vote as an important indicator of the bill’s future.
What the 232,000 Jobs Number Means
The NCA’s Crypto at Work study, produced by Pragmatic Policy Group, estimates that the crypto economy supports approximately 232,000 jobs nationwide. The figure includes about 75,000 supplier-related jobs and another 123,000 positions generated through spending by workers employed in crypto-linked roles.
The study calculates these broader effects using economic multipliers covering areas such as cloud services, accounting, legal work, transportation and housing. It relies on 2024 Bureau of Economic Analysis input-output tables, Bureau of Labor Statistics data and an estimated $23.22 billion in industry revenue from Statista.
The report projects that crypto activity will contribute more than $55 billion to U.S. GDP in 2026 and generate approximately $31 billion in employee income. It estimates average wages in the sector at about $133,000, compared with a national median of roughly $64,000.
Still, the numbers are modeled estimates rather than official employment statistics or a direct count of workers. The research was commissioned by the NCA, which is headed by Alderoty.
Alderoty wrote on August 30 that voting for CLARITY amounts to supporting jobs and economic growth. That claim is a policy position, however, and does not establish that the legislation itself would create a specific number of jobs.
The NCA’s analysis measures the crypto industry’s current estimated economic contribution. It does not quantify additional employment that could result from CLARITY establishing a federal regulatory structure that divides digital-asset oversight between the SEC and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
