Two worlds collide at an upper-class event, where a man working for a charity grovels for donations, and a millionaire French aristocrat looks for a cause that will make her seem altruistic.

A wealthy man in Chicago suddenly learns about the untimely death of a poor woman he'd been dating. Confronted with her child, whom he'd begun to develop a bond with, he must determine to what extent he will allow his greed to overcome his compassion.

A wealthy woman's ploy to flaunt her wealth is foiled by her old friend's seeming indifference to opulence - until they part, and the friend asks for money. The afternoon is ruined when the woman realizes that her obsession with money has ruined her outlook on life.

When an impoverished man shows up to a wealthy woman's door in dire need of help, she gives him ten dollars and tries to send him on his way. The man insists that he return the next day to thank her husband for the money, but she isn't quite sure if things are as they seem.

The daughter of a rich family must stop her parents from discriminating against their poor neighbors.

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 imaginary Black servant on a turn-of-the-century plantation ends up permanently changing the owner's fortunes — despite being a figment of his imagination.

A complex web of human relationships is presented in the form of an algebraic expression.

An unhappy woman lives in the slums of New York only to watch her life transform as her children become wildly successful, catapulting her into an unrecognizable world of extravagance.

A group of working class people run a dangerous path toward a promised Elysium, and those who survive are rewarded with nothing they can appreciate or comprehend.