George Bailey knew how to fend off a bank run. When the citizens of Bedford Falls ran to the bank to demand a return of their deposits, they encountered George, in the form of Jimmy Stewart, guarding the vault with a moral lesson.
“The money’s not there,” he explained, as banker turned preacher, pleading that one family’s savings had been invested in another family’s home. To panic, he argued, would hurt the entire community.
George at least had time to run to the bank and summon his thoughts. Contrast that with what happened at the Silicon Valley Bank in California late last week.
