To earn enough money for college, a high school graduate takes a grueling factory job. He expects his only takeaway from the work to be a paycheck, but a mysterious coworker teaches him about the world and his place in it.

An employee writes a heartfelt letter to his former boss to argue that he was wrongfully fired. As he lays out his life story, his hidden cowardice and stubborn ambitions paint a different story.

A manager at a railroad electrifying company reluctantly takes on a man who is being abused by his wife, allowing him to try his best at the job and earn some money. Unfortunately, the man’s hard work is soon eclipsed by his wife’s brutality.

When he and his fellow workers are left unemployed by the mechanization of the cotton-picking process, a man overcomes his instincts to flee, and stays with his friends as they set out to make a new life.

An unemployed husband learns of an affair between his wife and her boss. He writes an emotional letter to the boss that details the course of his failing marriage, and he pleads with the boss to not take his wife away from him.

An aging factory worker faces a jarring surprise at work months before his retirement. As capitalism chugs along, employees get caught in its cogs.

On the Great Plains, an aging farmer and his wife struggle to sell their produce amid an increase in frozen food manufacturing. The farmer must figure out how to avoid the fate of his neighbors, who were pushed out of business and into welfare dependence.

Two plumbers in Cleveland finally catch their big break when an investor decides to fund their movie.

A Jewish communist quit working at an editorial bureau where his co-workers are bothered by his leftist ideology because of his boss' praises of him.

After receiving a substantial promotion at work, a man gleefully returns home to his loving wife and learns his brother is visiting. However, the man’s luck begins to turn once his brother takes them out for a night on the town and dances with his wife.