Songfacts®:

• Springsteen never had a job doing something other than making music, but many of his songs deal with characters who work very hard trying to get by. Others deal with guys who are somewhat deranged. This song tells the story of a guy who covers both bases. He works on the road crew for the county hoping for a better life. He meets a girl and takes her to Florida, where cops show up to arrest him, probably because she's underage. Now he's still working on the highway, but on a chain gang because he's in jail.
  
  "I'm On Fire," another Springsteen song from the same era, also hints at these kind of bad intentions.
• "Working On The Highway" evolved from a song Springsteen started working on in 1981 called "Child Bride."
• Springsteen originally recorded this song as part of a demo he taped in his house in 1982. That tape became the no-frills Nebraska album, released later that year, but "Working On The Highway" got reworked in a boisterous arrangement for the Born In The U.S.A. album, released in 1984.
• "Working On The Highway" made the cut out of about 70 songs Springsteen had written for the Born In The U.S.A. album. It's a deep cut, but one he's played in concert from time to time throughout his career.
• Eric Church joined Springsteen to perform this song at the "Stand Up for Heroes" benefit concert in Madison Square Garden on November 5, 2018. It was the first time the pair performed together, but they've long admired each other's work. In 2011 Church celebrated Bruce on his 2011 hit "Springsteen."