The very real hope for a change in living conditions is at the heart of each character in Out of This Furnace. Without a secure job or knowledge of America, each one immigrates to America with the hope that life can be better, at least better than it was back in Hungary. Like many other immigrant men, George Kracha leaves his wife behind to try and secure a better life in America. As he later tells Mike Dobrejcak, powerful men like emperors and dukes own and run everything in Hungary, creating a powerful class of people he likens to the bosses and upper class in America. Despite these similarities, George leaves Hungary and finds his sister in New Haven, Pennsylvania, where his brother-in-law, Andrej, has tentatively secured him a job. Later, he and Andrej must pay an Irish foreman to “secure” George’s job in Braddock. The hope is that, with this job, he can now make something of himself and realize his dreams of a better life.

Hope is more understated in the first generation of Kracha’s, but George engages fully in this hope for change when he realizes that for him to succeed in life, he will need to go into business for himself, and so opens a butcher shop.