This song is about young people living in the northeast of America (translation)
Their lives are miserable because the steal factories are closing down (translation)
They desperately want to leave (translation)
But they stay because they were brought up to believe that things were going to get better (translation)
Maybe that sounds familiar (translation)
Well we're living here in Allentown
And they're closing all the factories down
Out in bethlehem they're killing time
Filling out forms
Standing in line
Well our fathers fought the second world war
Spent their weekends on the jersey shore
Met our mothers in the U.S.O.
Asked them to dance
Danced with them slow
And we're living here in Allentown
But the restlessness was handed down
And it's getting very hard to stay
Well we're waiting here in allentown
For the Pennsylvania we never found
For the promises our teachers gave
If we worked hard
If we behaved
So the graduations hang on the wall
Awh they never really helped us at all
No they never taught us what was real
Iron and coke
And chromium steel
And we're waiting here in Allentown
But they've taken all the coal from the ground
And the union people crawled away
Every child had a pretty good shot
To get at least as far as their old man got
But something happened on the way to that place
They threw an American flag in our face
Well I'm living here in Allentown
And it's hard to keep a good man down
But I won't be getting up today
And it's getting very hard to stay
And we're living here in Allentown