G                        C
Now, if you want higher wages let me tell you what to do
           D7                         G
You got to talk to the workers in the shop with you.
                                     C
You got to build you a union, got to make it strong,
           D7
But if you all stick together, boys, it won't be long.
        G              C
You get shorter hours, better working conditions,
  D7                                      G
Vacations with pay. Take your kids to the seashore.

[Verse]
         G                       C
It ain't quite this simple, so I better explain
         D7                     G
Just why you got to ride on the union train.
                                   C
'Cause if you wait for the boss to raise your pay,
          D7
We'll all be a-waitin' 'til Judgment Day.
      G              C
We'll all be buried, gone to heaven,
    D7                         G
St. Peter'll be the straw boss then.

[Verse]
        G                             C
Now you know you're underpaid but the boss says you ain't;
   D7                              G
He speeds up the work 'til you're 'bout to faint.
                                 C
You may be down and out, but you ain't beaten,
        D7
You can pass out a leaflet and call a meetin'.
G             C
Talk it over, speak your mind,
  D7                    G
Decide to do somethin' about it.

[Verse]
            G                      C
Course, the boss may persuade some poor damn fool
   D7                     G
To go to your meetin' and act like a stool.
                                         C
But you can always tell a stool, though, that's a fact,
           D7
He's got a yellow streak a-runnin' down his back.
           G                    C
He doesn't have to stool, he'll always get along
   D7                               G
On what he takes out of blind men's cups.

[Verse]
    G                           C
You got a union now, and you're sittin' pretty,
                D7                   G
Put some of the boys on the steering committee.
               C
The boss won't listen when one guy squawks,
         D7
But he's got to listen when the union talks.
     G       C
He'd better, be mighty lonely
   D7                       G
If everybody decide to walk out on him.

[Verse]
   G                                     C
Suppose they're working you so hard it's just outrageous
            D7                 G
And they're paying you all starvation wages.
                           C
You go to the boss and the boss would yell,
   D7                                              G
"Before I raise your pay I'd see you all in hell."
           G                     C
Well, he's puffing a big seegar, feeling mighty slick
          D7                   G
'Cause he thinks he's got your union licked.
                                  C
Well, he looks out the window and what does he see
      D7
But a thousand pickets, and they all agree:
       G        C       D7
He's a bastard, unfair, slavedriver,
             G
Bet he beats his wife!

[Verse]
           G                  C
Now, boys, you've come to the hardest time.
    D7                         G
The boss will try to bust your picket line.
                               C
He'll call out the police, the National Guard,
        D7
They'll tell you it's a crime to have a union card.
        G                          C
They'll raid your meetin', they'll hit you on the head,
        D7
They'll call every one of you a goddam red,
G            C               D7                  G
Unpatriotic, Japanese spies, sabotaging national defense!

[Verse]
    G                   C
But out at Ford, here's what they found,
    D7                        G
And out in Pittsburgh, here's what they found,
    G                             C
And out at Allis-Chalmers, here's what they found,
            D7                G
And down at Bethlehem, here's what they found:
                                  C
That if you don't let red-baiting break you up,
           D7                     G
And if you don't let stoolpigeons break you up,
                                C
And if you don't let vigilantes break you up,
           D7
And if you don't let race hatred break you up,

[Outro]
G           N.C.
You'll win. What I mean, take it easy, but take it!