It's a Wonderful Life script

Hi, patrons! Here is the script to the latest episode. It's a little different from the final cut and has more lines than in the video.

 AUDIO 1
 It's a Wonderful Life is the story of George Bailey and his lifelong antagonistic relationship with Mr. Potter, the richest man in town. When George is facing both financial and legal troubles, he contemplates suicide but is rescued by an angel named Clarence. The angel shows George what his home town, Bedford Falls, would have been had he not been around to hold back the monopolistic Mr. Potter. The town of Bedford Falls come through for George in the end, saving him from his troubles and from the machinations of the capitalist banker and landlord who practically rules the town. Due to a combination of the themes of anti-greed and America's post-war obsession with communist infiltrators, the FBI investigated the production and the screenwriters of the film, labeling it as communist propaganda. The FBI report, among other things, stated With regard to the picture "It's a Wonderful Life", [redacted] stated in substance that the film represented rather obvious attempts to discredit bankers by casting Lionel Barrymore as a "scrooge-type" so that he would be the most hated man in the picture. This, according to these sources, is a common trick used by Communists.  
  In addition, [redacted] stated that, in his opinion, this picture deliberately maligned the upper class, attempting to show the people who had money were mean and despicable characters. This opinion was brought to the House Un-American Activities Committee. There was some talk, a defense of the film by some, and eventually HUAC opted not to pursue the matter further. The FBI and the House Committee was wrong that it was “Communist” propaganda, partly because “propaganda” requires intent and neither the Communist Party nor the Soviet Union was involved in the creation of the classic Frank Capra film. However, they may have been correct in that it did not necessarily reflect American values because one of those values is undoubtedly an unflinching belief in capitalism. It's a Wonderful Life pokes holes in how capitalism works and how it will always work toward benefiting the wealthiest and creating greater and greater income inequality over time. Americans broadly supported the House Un-American Activities Committee. The Soviet Union was, after all, an authoritarian state under the thumb of a cruel dictator.   
 AUDIO 2
 In America, socialism became associated almost exclusively with the Soviet Union. In truth, socialists are among the harshest critics of authoritarian states. Socialism is simply advocacy for the means of production to be either owned or regulated collectively rather than consolidated by the few. Capitalism is the opposite. The FBI was wrong that It's a Wonderful Life was propaganda for Communist Russia, but that's because any criticism of capitalism in America was pejoratively labeled “communism” as a way to shut down the argument. Most so-called “known communists” listed in these reports were, at best, critics of American politics or just not right-wing enough for J. Edgar Hoover's liking. Also because Americans did not see a distinction between reasonable criticism of capitalism and being an agent of Joseph Stalin. This continues today, even as “socialism” has replaced “communism” as the boogeyman for right-wing America. To this day, Americans are taught that capitalism makes us rich and socialism makes us poor, but in modern history, we have seen a great sum of evidence that shows that not to be true – in fact, the opposite is true. Capitalism is what made Americans poor, and socialism is what made Europeans have stability.   
 Capitalism makes some rich, such as Mr. Potter from the film, but not the vast majority of Americans. America has the world’s first two trillion dollar companies — Apple and Amazon. In one thought of America as industry and not its people, one could argue that capitalism makes America rich, but we are people – not industry. Corporate profits have never been higher, but the average American’s life has fallen apart. The George Baileys of the world. Amazon has made Jeff Bezos – our real life Mr. Potter – the richest man in the world. His lieutenants and vice presidents and such are all millionaires, too, but people working the warehouse are never going to be rich. Capitalism does not make the people rich. It makes a few people rich. The George Baileys of the world will working, most likely, until they die. Let's return to the film. It's a Wonderful Life is largely a conflict between a powerful arch-capitalist who owns a big bank and George Bailey, who runs a comparatively small building and loan association in the town of Bedford Falls.
 AUDIO 3
 The building and loan is what keeps the residents of Bedford Falls able to buy homes. Mr. Potter wants to shut down the building and loan for this reason. [clip: “If Potter gets hold of this Building and Loan, there’ll never be another decent house built in this town … He wants to keep you living in his slums and paying the kind of rent he decides.”] George Bailey's speech reminds us of the power and relative security that society offers to homeowners in contrast to those who are perpetual renters and therefore subject to the whims of landlords. Proponents of capitalism would insist that Mr. Potter is an outlier and that capitalism is designed to make the populace rich, not only the few. Whether designed in theory or created in praxis, capitalism functions to make the rich richer and the poor poorer, as evidenced by the increasing gap in wages between the rich and rich. In America, the stalwart of capitalism, income inequality – meaning the gap between the rich and everyone else -- has been growing markedly and by every major statistical measure for over 30 years.    
 Income disparities have become so pronounced that America’s top 10 percent now average more than nine times as much income as the bottom 90 percent – meaning the rest of us. Americans in the top 1 percent tower stunningly higher. They average over 40 times more income than the bottom 90 percent. Worse still, the divide between the nation’s top 0.1 percent and everyone else shows that Americans at this lofty level are taking in over 198 times the income of the bottom 90 percent. Mr. Potter is not a Dickension hyperbole of the wealthy. He is the standard. His expressions may be cartoonish, but the depiction of wealth hoarding is accurate by any statistical measure. Income inequality is not a bug in capitalism, it is a feature. The rich support capitalist states through lobbying for their greater rights and gain power within the government. The state enacts a kind of “corporate welfare” for big business. Capitalism decrees that the rich deserve to be rich, and the poor deserve to the poor because there are consequences to business and risk. However, every time there is a crisis, the taxpayer is called on to bail out the banks and the major financial institutions.    
  AUDIO 4  
  In the film, we see such a financial crisis, as the people of Bedford Falls, uncertain of their financial security, rush the banks. When capitalist CEO's fail, they rely on the collective power of the people – notably their taxes – to save themselves. If they followed capitalism the way it is explained on paper, that would not be happening. Capitalists who made risky investments and failed would be wiped out. But the rich and powerful do not want a capitalist system for themselves – only for the poor. They want to be able to run the state so that when they're in trouble the taxpayer will bail them out. Mr. Potter believes that his bank is the product of his hard work and his mind, but there are other factors that allow banks to prosper. The success of big US banks – which Potter represents -- is attributed to the advantages that come from the implicit government insurance policy — that includes the aforementioned bailouts but also access to cheap credit and the incentive to undertake risky transactions with little downside due to the state always being there to secure a faltering bank that is “too big to fail.” So how did Americans get so poor?    
 The reason is that their incomes have been flat since around the 1970's, and with corporate welfare and anti-union attitudes and other capitalist sentiments held by the President of the United States in the 80's, no relief was coming. Incomes have been flat while costs of life have exploded. Everything that is essential to life has gone by up by hundreds, if not thousands of percent. Healthcare — 2000%. Education — 1000%. Rent — 500%. Food — 400%. The result is that Americans are deep in debt, which is charged at exorbitant interest rates, because it's mostly put on credit cards. Their net worth has declined, as a result. In the film, George Bailey tells the people that this is what Mr. Potter wants. He wants the people to remain poor so that he can have control over them. Again, this is a feature in capitalism, not a bug. It is the desired outcome of capitalists like Mr. Potter. If the people are poor, their choices are limited. You can’t do without shelter. You have to buy it, or in the case of many in Bedford Falls, rent them.    
  AUDIO 5  
 Either way, you must pay for food, shelter, healthcare, education and so forth. But they have mostly been monopolized, which is to say, the market has been cornered by capitalists, therefore limiting choices. The people of Bedford Falls are able to collectively stand against Mr. Potter, but collective bargaining has taken a hit in the decades after the events of the film. In the United States today, unions have a much smaller economic presence than they did decades ago. With unions playing a smaller economic role, the gap between worker and CEO pay was eight times larger in 2016 than in 1980. In the 80's and 90's, US employers developed a set of legal and illegal practices that proved effective at ridding establishments of existing unions and preventing nonunion workers from organizing. Anti-union sentiment from capitalist politicians This, coupled with competition from overseas markets, reduced collective bargaining dramatically by the 21st century. When Clarence shows George Bailey what Bedford Falls would be like if he had never been born, we see a capitalist dystopia in which Mr. Potter has taken over the town.    
 Potter's exploitation could continue unimpeded by the only thing that had enough collective power to stand in its way. Capitalism grew so rich precisely by exploiting the average American, leaving them in a state called “immiseration” — being paid just enough to subsist, and having all the cream of your labor -- your energy, creativity, ideas, passion and hard work skimmed off the top. “Immiseration” is being offered the lowest price possible for your labor, and having no choice but to take it while also having to pay the highest price possible for the very things you create. We see this in the film, this feeling of being unable to escape due to financial concerns. George wants to travel the world and be his own man, but every time he is prepared for this big trip, capitalism threatens either himself or the people of the town, forcing him to rearrange his plans. He’s immiserated — he lives a life that’s not very good, but one which he can’t escape from. Capitalism has him right where it wants him both as a consumer and a producer. But the capitalist dystopia of Pottersville in the altered reality part of It's a Wonderful Life is not a bizarro world.
 AUDIO 6 It is late capitalism – a capitalism that  consolidates even more wealth in the few and creates a precarious situation for everyone who is not among those few. Oddly enough, “late capitalism” is said to have begun shortly after World War II, the present day time period of It's a Wonderful Life. George always talks of seeing Europe, and frankly, he might do better there than in Bedford Falls. Europeans who live in countries that have embraced some level of socialism, even a small amount, don’t face dilemmas Americans do: Pay for healthcare or education? Pay the rent or my doctor's visit? George Bailey, faced with more and more impossible financial dilemmas, contemplates suicide. Socialism allows countries to have citizens free of punishment for the slightest mistake. Europe invested in public goods, which means they are collectively built through taxpayers. Europe built great public systems of healthcare, education, housing and retirement. Those systems do the opposite of what capitalism does in America — they provide the essentials of life at the lowest cost possible, and usually, at the highest reasonable wage too.   Taxes are higher to institute and maintain these systems, but in spite of this, poverty is much lower and the disparity between the rich and poor is smaller. The higher taxes do NOT create more poverty because of where the taxes go. They actually reduce poverty. In America, the sight of George Bailey preparing to commit suicide has become commonplace. Recent health insurance data shows that major depression and therefore suicidal ideation is on the rise among ALL age groups. … So, what have we learned here today? Well, It's a Wonderful Life is, at best, semi-socialist. It critiques capitalist institutions but does not call for either a socialist revolution or reform. The townspeople might be a little too Norman Rockwell for all that, and actual politicians are largely absent from the film. Yet, it does contain some kernels of truth, some nuggets of wisdom that are still relevant now.