The novel is set in the fictional Junction City, Iowa,[Note 1] a few years after the end of the Second World War.

The novel humorously follows the problems of Sidney Sorokin from Chicago, recently hired as a labor superintendent at the Sleep Tite pajama factory, as the union stages a slowdown over its demand for a 7+1⁄2 cents per hour wage increase.

Sid Sorokin, the new superintendent at the Sleep Tite pajama factory, finds himself patching up endless little problems caused by the cheapskate policies of his boss, Myron Hasler, acting for T. J. O'Hara, the owner who is taking a long vacation in the middle of nowhere.

Hasler is a devotee of conservative radio pundit Fulton Lewis, ardently anti-union, and a self-proclaimed "fighter", but with no previous experience in the garment industry.

Sorokin gets himself drunk and dragged to a party at the wealthy Watson's house, where the spoiled heiress takes him to bed.