Greed, the Individual, and the Collective. Also Known As: Aren't We All George Bailey?

By Jillian O'Malior, Founder & CEO, New World Labs

PUBLISHED: December 16, 2025

Tonight, I watched “It’s a Wonderful Life” with my daughter.

I normally only watch this on Christmas Eve, after she’s gone to bed and I’m prepping for the next morning. It’s become a peaceful ritual, wrapping up the season with one of the most classic movies in the holiday canon. But she had never seen it, and so I decided to break with tradition for this year so I could be the one to introduce it to her.

My god, that movie hits really different at the close of 2025.

Because here I am: 13 months to the day post-layoff. Another final interview round rejection deep. Little on the horizon, personal carnage in the rearview. Exhaustion and fear and anxiety filling every nook and cranny of my mind and body. Mountains of debt and some looming legalities out in front of me. Watching the life and career I built so carefully, so deliberately, so meticulously seemingly dismantled without cause.

I feel so much like George Bailey on that bridge somedays: beaten and bloodied, defeated and hopeless. Wondering how it got so bad, so fast.

But that movie is so beautiful. And I think it’s impossible to watch it and not feel the glimmer of hope, even at your darkest points.

Because while I know so many of us can see the message in the movie: a message of faith, of community. A message of the human spirit fighting to survive. In watching it with my 11 year old, seeing it through her eyes for the first time, there is something in it that fired me up even more.

Which is that I fucking LOVE that the underlying message of the movie is about the greed, the soullessness, the utter destruction and degradation that is wrought when the capitalist villains are left unchecked.

Spare Me Your Econ Lectures

I’ve talked about this before, on LinkedIn and TikTok, and I always get the inevitable messages from the beta bros: “Huh, maybe if you understood basic economics, you wouldn’t be making arguments about livable wages.” Or, their favorite tired-ass argument to trot out, “uhhh, this is called communism honey, read a history book.”

Because ensuring that all human beings are able to live outside of abject poverty is definitely the controversial and immoral take. Good one Chad.

And you know how I know that’s a tired, worn-out argument? Cuz it’s the same one used when the movie came out in 1947, accusing it of be anti-American propaganda.

An American Classic and HUAC

When “It’s a Wonderful Life” first came out, it was on the heels of World War II Hollywood, years before the Cold War and Red Scare gripped the nation. During the war, Hollywood was tasked by the U.S. Office of War Information with creating homegrown propaganda for the war effort: films that reflected patriotism yes, but also subtly promoted pro-Soviet ideals in order to garner American support for our wartime ally.

But this was the golden age of cinema, and with genius filmmakers like Frank Capra at the helm, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover started to become paranoid (hallmark Hoover move) that the plan was working just a TOUCH too well.

Because art, and film specifically, is an incredibly persuasive form of influence. Our human souls CRAVE art: we crave stories, we crave narratives, we crave seeing ourselves and our thoughts and ideals and experiences reflected back to us. It makes us feel more connected, more seen, more valued. More human. It’s why we love it, it’s why we consume it at the rate we do.

And because of the power of art and storytelling, it can sway public attitudes pretty well. Particularly in stories where we see ourselves reflected back in a protagonist who is fighting the good fight on behalf of the people who look and live just like us.

So while during the war Hollywood worked to sanitize the realities of Soviet life in order to prop up our allies, Hoover worried we’d gone too far. Because in highlighting the quiet heroism of the everyman (and more importantly, by putting him in opposition to his antagonist, the capitalistic wealthy baron), and reinforcing the power of the collective; we might just (GASP!) show Americans that their individual lives are deserving of value and dignity, and that there is a power in numbers to overwrite the decrepit greed of unchecked capitalism.

And as that paranoia took over, as the constant worry of communist propaganda infiltrating our cultural consumption took shape, as the fear that too many Mr. Potter characters were changing the hearts and minds of Americans (“what IF the corporate overlords aren’t the heroes after all?”), Hoover leaned in.

FBI informants were placed throughout Hollywood for surveillance. Ayn Rand, Queen Mother of unfettered self-interest, penned a guide for the hallmarks of communist propaganda. The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) was formed. And the Hollywood blacklist was instituted.

From Then to Now

Here’s the thing: all of this (Hoover, HUAC, blacklisting and artistic surveillance) is WIDELY considered a black mark in American history. In our fear and paranoia, we turned neighbor against neighbor. We feared and panicked and forgot about the everyman and tried to stay in line in the name of patriotic compliance. Civil liberties were violated and powers were abused, and there is a veil of shame around how all of that was handled. It was far-reaching and widely baseless.

Hell, “Mr. Smith Goes To Washington,” one of the greatest pieces of art made about the power of American democracy in action, was considered subversive. Folks were crashing out and lashing out, all in the name of “don’t let us turn into a communist state.” And “It’s A Wonderful Life” was caught up in that too.

Getting Down to Brass Tacks

Here’s the thing: there is ABSOLUTELY a progressive-leaning message in the movie. That’s no secret. I mean, just read the best monologue in the movie:

“Just a minute now, hold on Mr. Potter … you’re right when you say my father was no business man. Why he ever started this cheap, penny-ante Building and Loan, I’ll never know. But neither you nor anybody else can say anything against his character … he never once thought of himself … he didn’t save up enough money to send Harry to school, let alone me. But he did help a few people get out of your slums, Mr. Potter. And what’s wrong with that? Why, you’re all businessmen here. Don’t it make them better citizens? Doesn’t it make them better customers?

… Just remember this, Mr. Potter, that this rabble you’re talking about, they do most of the working and paying and living and dying in this community. Well, is it too much to have them work and pay and live and die in a couple of decent rooms and a bath? Anyway, my father didn’t think so. People were human beings to him, but you to, a warped, frustrated old man they’re cattle … you’re talking about something you can’t get your fingers on and it’s galling you … this town needs this measly one-horse institution if only to have some place where people can come without crawling to Potter.”

But where’s the lie?

Honestly: I read that, I watch that, I hear the great Jimmy Stewart say those lines with such conviction and passion and I am completely moved. Not just because it’s great art, not just because it’s pushing a message, but because IT’S TRUE.

If the fight is for human dignity over corporate greed, why is that controversial? If the belief is in collective care over individual power, why is that bad? If the story is about everyone being rewarded for their work and effort with a life that provides them security and reasonable comfort, why is that questioned? What do we gain by siding with Mr. Potter? He’ll pay us 50 cents on the dollar for our shares of our investment, taking ownership of the little we lay claim to in this world, and expect a “thank you.”

And it shows what this unchecked greed can manifest into: Pottersville, filled with debasement and profiteering. Dime-a-dance halls and pawn shops and slums. No community, no collective care. A town run for the individual profit and power of one man provides little more than base-level survival for what’s left of its inhabitants. The troubled Mr. Gower is turned out onto the streets to beg. Violet is forced into bodily exploitation and then violently arrested for it. The hardworking immigrant Martini is nowhere to be found. And George can only stare in horror as the town and community he has fought his entire life to both escape and protect ceases to exist once the last bit of protection from an oligarch is removed.

It’s Giving 2025

Circling back, Communist Barbie style, it’s so fascinating to me how slowly we lose our own lessons. Because so many people spend their days fighting each other: fighting about affordable housing, about layoffs and unemployment. About livable wages and healthcare and SNAP benefits and government assistance. We call each other lazy, we call each other leeches. We accuse one another of taking advantage of the system, insist we pull ourselves up by our bootstraps like WE had to do. Say there’s no room for anyone in this country who isn’t from here.

And then so many of those people sit there throughout the month of December. Talk about peace, talk about gratitude and giving thanks. Talk about “it’s the reason for the season” and angel trees and giving back. And they sit and watch this American masterpiece of cinema and say “I AM George Bailey, George Bailey is ME.”

But then we watch the first individual trillionaire be crowned while arguing about who deserves basic assistance. We watch black communities be destroyed in the name of AI dominance while shaming job seekers. We watch immigrants and citizens be disappeared from our streets while arguing the meritocracy of DEI.

We watch Pottersville being built before our eyes, our beloved Bedford Falls get torn down brick by brick, and then turn around and tell George Bailey he’s an uneducated communist who should just comply if he wants to survive.

But we’re all George. We’re all Mary. We’re all Uncle Billy, we’re Harry, we’re Violet. We’re Bert and Ernie and Martini and Mr. Gower and Nick. We know better deep down that Mr. Potter shaking a handkerchief at us and saying that serving him is the only way out is a false idol. But we want to believe our struggle MEANS something. We’ve been conditioned to believe that dignity is earned, not assumed. But that conditioning reinforces the “every man for himself,” the inherent competition, the baked-in defenses. And it allows us, the rabble, to fight for the scraps of dignity that remain after the Mr. Potters assume their control and feed their endless greed.

2025 has highlighted that divide so starkly in so many ways. So I end with this:

You are more George Bailey than you are Mr. Potter.

And that fight you feel every day for relevance, for dignity, for a life that feels of value to you is valid. But let’s let all of us George Bailey’s come together to take control of our dignity and value.

No communist propaganda required.