At first, the purpose of the story did not make sense to me. However, upon closer analysis of the reading, it has become clear that the main idea of the story focuses on a common conflict; the fight between capitalism and communism. Rand represents capitalism through the hard workers such as Dagny and Hank and portrays communism through James, Orren, Paul, etc. As the novel progresses, the conflict between these two parties becomes more evident.
When this book was published in 1957 the Cold War was still going strong. In the Cold War you basically had democratic, capitalist America pitted against the communist Soviet Union. This book never comes out and makes a direct reference to the Cold War, since it's more of an alternate universe America, but readers at the time would have recognized that the ideas Taggart and Co. say closely resemble that of communist ideals. A lot of Americans at the time thought that the Soviet Union was basically hell on Earth, so they would have seen Taggart and Co. as evil.
During chapter three, James Taggart, Orren Boyle, Paul Larkin, and Wesley Mouch have a meeting to discuss, in a roundabout kind of way, What is Wrong with America. Basically, with this meeting, it seems as though they have been reading a lot of Karl Marx. However, on the other side of the main conflict, you have a character like Hank Rearden to represent the hard working capitalism. The man cherishes the work that he has put into his new "miracle metal" and revisits the memories of late nights of labor that he put in. He also carries a bracelet that is made of this medal to give to his wife because of how proud of he is of his success. However his family, who portrays the ideals of communism, completely shoot down his feelings of success even though they are far worse off than he is. So, it is clear that there is a huge conflict within the story between the big powers, capitalism and communism.
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