A little more than a day before the nation’s highway and transit projects would lose funding—threatening nearly 2 million jobs—and student loan interest rates were set to double, Congress acted.

The House (373-52) and Senate (74-19) this afternoon passed the two-year, $120 million Surface Transportation Extension Act of 2012 that will protect more than 2 million jobs and expand a loan guarantee program that could create an additional 1 million jobs (mostly in the construction sector). The bill also keeps interest rates for college students on subsidized Stafford Loans at 3.4 percent. They were set to double on July 1 to 6.8 percent.

Uncertainty over whether Congress will fund transportation infrastructure not only endangers drivers and airline passengers, but creates a credit risk for companies involved, according to a new study by Standard & Poor's.

House Republicans are playing chicken again with our economy, says AFL-CIO Transportation Trades Department President Edward Wytkind on The Huffington Post.

Instead of moving a highway and transit bill that will put Americans to work—a move the Senate was able to pull off by a vote of 74 to 26—House leaders want to punt with another short-term extension.

There is an easy solution to this problem—the House can take up the Senate's bipartisan bill (MAP-21) and put millions to work and improve our surface transportation system. President Obama will sign that bill tomorrow.