There’s a Vietnam Vet with a cardboard sign 

Sitting there by the left turn line 

Flag on his wheelchair flapping in the breeze 

One leg missing and both hands free 

No one’s paying much mind to him 

The V.A. budget’s just stretched so thin 

And now there’s more coming back from the Mideast war 

We can’t make it here anymore 





That big ol’ building was the textile mill that fed our kids and it paid our bills 

But they turned us out and they closed the doors 

We can’t make it here anymore 





See those pallets piled up on the loading dock 

They’re just gonna sit there ‘til they rot 

‘Cause there’s nothing to ship, nothing to pack 

Just busted concrete and rusted tracks 

Empty storefronts around the square 

There’s a needle in the gutter and glass everywhere 

You don’t come down here unless you’re looking to score 

We can’t make it here anymore 



The bar’s still open but man it’s slow 

The tip jar’s light and the register’s low 

The bartender don’t have much to say 

The regular crowd gets thinner each day 

Some have maxed out all their credit cards 

Some are working two jobs and living in cars 

Minimum wage won’t pay for a roof, won’t pay for a drink 

If you gotta have proof just try it yourself Mr. CEO 

See how far $5.15 an hour will go 

Take a part time job at one your stores 

Bet you can’t make it here anymore 



There’s a high school girl with a bourgeois dream 

Just like the pictures in the magazine 

She found on the floor of the laundromatA woman with kids can forget all that 

If she comes up pregnant what’ll she do 

Forget the career, forget about school 

Can she live on faith? Live on hope? 

High on Jesus or hooked on dope 

When it’s way too late to just say no 

You can’t make it here anymore 



Now I’m stocking shirts in the Wal-Mart store 

Just like the ones we made before 

‘ Cept this one came from Singapore 

I guess we can’t make it here anymore 



Should I hate a people for the shade of their skin 

Or the shape of their eyes or the shape I’m in 

Should I hate ‘em for having our jobs today 

No I hate the men sent the jobs away 

I can see them all now, they haunt my dreams 

All lily white and squeaky clean 

They’ve never known want, they’ll never know need 

Their shit don’t stink and their kids won’t bleed 

Their kids won’t bleed in their damn little war 

And we can’t make it here anymore 



Will work for food will die for oil 

Will kill for power and to us the spoils 

The billionaires get to pay less tax 

The working poor get to fall through the cracks 

So let ‘em eat jellybeans let ‘em eat cake 

Let ‘em eat shit, whatever it takes 

They can join the Air Force, or join the Corps 

If they can’t make it here anymore 



So that’s how it is, that’s what we got 

If the president wants to admit it or not 

You can read it in the paper, read it on the wall 

Hear it on the wind if you’re listening at all 

Get out of that limo, look us in the eye 

Call us on the cell phone tell us all why 



In Dayton Ohio or Portland Maine 

Or a cotton gin out on the great high plains 

That’s done closed down along with the school 

And the hospital and the swimming pool 

Dust devils dance in the noonday heat 

There’s rats in the alley and trash in the street 

Gang graffiti on a boxcar door 

We can’t make it here anymore