A woman returns home to her family having just slept with another man. At dinner, her son gets into an argument with his father about their privilege. As the narrative moves back to the time they spent abroad in Nigeria, Burma and Ecuador, fractures in the family life are revealed.

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.

After fleeing Germany in the wake of World War II, two immigrants struggle to adjust to a new life of labor and hardship on an American farm.

A ranching family stays optimistic during tough times by remembers their good luck last summer when they persuaded a generous rancher to work on his farm.

A poor, ever-hopeful couple that imagines itself on the brink of a windfall suffers setback after setback, until the husband has a revelation about what in life holds real value.

An Italian man recounts how his father came into money upon arriving in the United States but spent and then lost it all when his factory caught fire. Despite his Papa’s veritable financial ignorance and dangerous pride, the son asserts none of it was ever his father's fault.

As an old woman revisits her family's quintessentially American history, she finds a way to respect and love her parents, despite the scandals and tragedies they endured.

A working class man who wants his children to have everything their rich friends have purchases "Semplica Girls" — girls formerly living in poverty who sign contracts to hang as ornaments in people's yards — for his older daughter's birthday. When his younger daughter frees the Semplica Girls, the family is plunged into financial disaster.

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.

After his wife leaves him, taking their kids, a man realizes that his vivid nightly dreams have disappeared with her.