Railroad owner Dagny Taggart and steel mogul Henry Rearden search desperately for the inventor of a revolutionary motor as the U.S. government continues to spread its control over the national economy.

Billy Austin served on the crew of the USN airship Macon until it crashed at sea during a storm. In the hospital, the captain has given him a watch with the motto of the crew 'It Shall Be Done' inscribed on it. He was discharged from the Navy after losing one leg to the crash and now needs a job. As he knows lumber, he applies at the Rick's Lumbering Co. and persists by seeing both vice presidents and then Mr. Ricks. The President does hire him and his job is to sell the wood no one wants to buy. Austin thrives and becomes the star salesman of the company. He has also met the daughter of the President and intends to marry.

The U.S. government decides to go after an agro-business giant with a price-fixing accusation, based on the evidence submitted by their star witness, vice president-turned-informant Mark Whitacre.

The film describes the events leading up to, and including, the massacre of the adults of a small town in Nebraska by their children, after the adults' irresponsibility ruins the crop and the children's future.

Popular and beautiful Fanny Trellis is forced into a loveless marriage with an older man, Jewish banker Job Skeffington, in order to save her beloved brother Trippy from an embezzlement charge.