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Scripts Aloud brings drama right into your ears. By using text-to-speech software, theater scripts go from the page into drama, every week. Typically 10-minute scripts are presented in each episode. It's like having a Theater Festival - right on your phone!
Win a dinner with Alan Greenspan!
By Rick Regan
August 26, 2020
The story is about a man, Willie, who wins a dinner with former Fed Chair Alan Greenspan. Willie wants
to understand why he is poor and other people are rich.
Characters:
Alan Greenspan, former chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of the United States of America
Willie, poor man from rural North Carolina
Waiter, restaurant waiterWin a dinner with Alan Greenspan!
Scene: (fancy restaurant in fancy hotel in DC)
Alan Greenspan:
(sitting alone, reading his phone. Clear cocktail on the table.)
WAITER:
(directs a man to the table) Ahem.
WILLIE:
You mister Greenspan?
ALAN:
Yes. Who are you?
WILLIE:
Hello, sir. I’m Willie. I won that there con-test to have dinner with you.
ALAN:
Umm. I think there has been a mistake.
WILLIE:
No mistake. I got all the I’s dotted and T’s crossed. Fair’n square.
ALAN:
Excuse me. (Picks up phone. Dials. Talks into phone.) James, listen.. oh, yes. No he’s here. I see. Really?
Tonight? It wasn’t on my schedule. Make sure I am not surprised by these things. OK. (hangs up)
WILLIE:
See? All right.
ALAN:
It appears I am to have the pleasure of your company tonight. I have another engagement in forty-five
minutes but I can give you my attention until then. What can he get you?
WILLIE:
Oh, well. Whatever you’re having, sir.
ALAN:
Walter, two gin martini’s, please. One for me and one for him. We’ll look at the menu in a moment.
WAITER:
Very good sir.
ALAN:
So, Willie. Please sit down. Tell me about yourself.Win a dinner with Alan Greenspan!
WILLIE:
I’m Willie. Everybody calls me Willie. At the plant, the chicken plant, everybody say, “Hey, Willie! Hey,
Willie! Bring mo’ ice!”
ALAN:
Ice?
WILLIE:
I hauls ice at the Per-due plant. Near outside Ahoskie. Best ice hauler anywhere, I bet!
ALAN:
I see. And what do you want from me?
WILLIE:
Well, Mister Greenspan, I figure you ‘bout the only man in the whole wide world who know how
everything work. Everything. The money. The government. Wars and peace. Even the aliens, they
probably told you. I don’t expect you care ‘bout Elvis, but maybe I ask anyway. And about slaves and
reparations. Ev’thing!
ALAN:
I’m sorry Willie. I don’t know about any of those things. I study monetary policy.
WILLIE:
Well, that’s just it. That’s what I want to know about. Monetary policy.
ALAN:
Why is that?
WILLIE:
Mister Greenspan, I never had no money in my life. No real money. I had an uncle. He had a bank and he
tell me, “Willie, you got to save yo’ moneys. You got to stack it up. Then for long it be stacking up itself.”
Well I never understood. How could moneys stack itself?
ALAN:
Compounding interest. I expect that is what he meant.
WILLIE:
Compound int’rest? Is that like a compound bow, get stronger the more you pull it?
ALAN:
A.. Compound bow? What is that?
WILLIE:
For hunting, sir. Like for wild hogs. You know, when they gets in the yard. Don’t want to use no bullets
cause they children ‘round. But a compound bow and a arrow, thunk! Right behind the ear. Dead, on
time. And good eating. Speaking of eating…Win a dinner with Alan Greenspan!
ALAN:
Of course. Walter, could you take our orders?
WAITER:
Yes, of course, Mister Greenspan. What can I get you tonight?
ALAN:
I will have my usual Greek salad, with a few extra olives, and a cup of the onion soup. How is the feta
tonight?
WAITER:
Wonderful, sir. Our cheese monger has the feta under very close watch, especially for you, sir.
ALAN:
Willie, is there anything you’d like? Fish, or chicken? A steak?
WILLIE:
Oh, no, I can’t eat no chicken. Not for a long time. I handle them chickens twelve hour a day. Live
chicken, dead chicken, sick chicken, cut up chicken. I bring the ice, but I can’t eat ‘em.
ALAN:
I see. Is there anything else that comes to mind. The chef here is quite remarkable.
WILLIE:
Now I am real partial to ham hocks and greens.
ALAN:
Understandably. Walter, what do you think?
WAITER:
I will ask the chef but I am confident that we can accommodate. Anything for dessert?
ALAN:
Perhaps a sherry at the time. Willie?
WILLIE:
You wouldn’t have a slice of coconut crème pie left to the side, would you? I love that pie.
WAITER:
I will defer to the pastry chef but I am sure she will have a few ideas. Very good gentlemen.
WILLIE:
Now Mister Greenspan, I want to know, need to know, how come they poor people and they rich
people? I been poor my whole life. Everybody I know be poor. Except the man who runs the plant, from
the Per-due company. He live up in Norfolk and drive down everyday. I never been to his house but I bet
it real nice. He seem like a real nice man. But I don’t understand why he rich and everybody, all around,
poor as mice.Win a dinner with Alan Greenspan!
ALAN:
Well, Willie, my work, my research, centers around the market function where an individual or a
company exploits their own hard work and innovation for advantage and wealth creation.
WILLIE:
What’s that mean?
ALAN:
OK. You trade your time and effort, and they pay you, give you money. Right.
WILLIE:
Sure enough.
ALAN:
So your contribution to the company is the sum of your time - and your effort, hauling ice, correct?
WILLIE:
Yes, sir.
ALAN:
So the company adds up your time and your ice-hauling and pays you. And you value the money, so you
keep going to work.
WILLIE:
But why is he rich and I not? He works hard. I work hard. Only twenty-four hours in the day. It ain’t like
he got more hours. But he must make a whole lot more than me.
ALAN:
I assume that the plant manager is doing more than just… just hauling ice, Willie. He’s responsible for
the smooth running of the plant. That is more valuable than hauling ice. And surely there must be a
machine to move ice around, a conveyor or something, to deliver ice.
WILLIE:
But I’m the best ice hauler all around! Ain’t no machine haul ice like me.
ALAN:
What happens when you go home at night? Do they turn off the machines and close the factory, all
because you are gone home so nobody has any ice?
WILLIE:
They’s two other fellas haul ice when I’m out.
ALAN:
But you are the main one, hauling ice.
WILLIE:
Right.Win a dinner with Alan Greenspan!
ALAN:
And how long until you retire, do you think?
WILLIE:
Retire? Can’t afford retire. Can’t afford the doctor-man. Can’t afford the rent. Can’t afford put gas up my
car. It’s like them po-lice cuffs; if you squeeze ‘em, they get tighter. Ain’t never get looser. It’s like that
all the time.
ALAN:
Well that’s how the economy works.
WILLIE:
But does it have to work like that? Does it have to be that the Per-due man work hard and makes a lot of
money. I work hard and I get near to nothing. They care about them chickens more than me. Does it
have to be like that? It seem like there’s a whole lot of money in the world, but folks don’t want to
spread it around and help out poor folks.
ALAN:
Well, people leverage their advantages, natural or systemic. We have a very dynamic economy.
WILLIE:
I don’t understand. Explain that to me. Why some people got… natural… advantage?
ALAN:
If a person grows up in a wealthy family, they will have the benefits of stable housing, good education,
broad social support. But, economic data indicate that someone born into the lowest quartile, or poor, is
going to remain poor throughout his life. That’s how it is.
WILLIE:
But I don’t understand why them folks don’t help everybody. Not just them that already got theirs. Why
not help all the Americans?
ALAN:
You mean just give people money? Direct-payments are a profound moral hazard.
WILLIE:
Moral hazard? They gone pay the rent!
ALAN:
Direct payments have been shown to de-incentivize work.
WILLIE:
Mister Greenspan, I haul ice in a chicken plant. If I could make more money doing anything, anything
else, I’d do it. Maybe if there was ‘direct payments’ to Americans, the Per-due company would pay us
more - spending our lives hauling ice or working on the cut-up line.Win a dinner with Alan Greenspan!
ALAN:
Wage hikes would negatively impact the operating costs of the corporation. The company would likely
close the plant and find a location with lower labor costs.
WILLIE:
Good! Let ‘em move then. They make everybody sick, broken down working in that plant. They take all
the water from the town and everything smells like raw chicken. I’d be glad to see them go if there was
any way to not starve to death. Maybe with your ‘di-rect payment’ idea, we can spend time with our
children, go to choich, help out with my mother. She by herself.
ALAN:
You are talking about diverting tax dollars to fund free handouts. You know the old adage, that when
something is taxed, there is less of it, but if something is free, the demand is unlimited. We can’t just
siphon off the GDP for handouts.
WILLIE:
Why not? Other governments, other countries do it. Seems like this government don’t care no how
about nobody, ‘cept rich folks.
ALAN:
And corporations.
WILLIE:
Xactly. Maybe we ought to tell people to leave, light-out. Go someplace where brotherly love is the law,
not them handcuffs that only get tighter. Maybe it’s time to make a plan to empty this country out. Just
leave the rich folks and the Per-due company. The rich folks can have all the chicken they wantin’.
ALAN:
A reverse migration of Americans is highly undesirable. By destabilizing the labor market, wages would…
rise. And communities would be hollowed out, robbing the municipal tax base.
WILLIE:
Oh, the municipality would be robbed? Or the town been robbin’ the people all along, for the good of
the Per-due company.
ALAN:
It’s just that the US has a flexible, dynamic economy, with stable institutions and rule of law. That can
not be said about many places around the world.
WILLIE:
You don’t think that some welcoming country wouldn’t be better off with a whole bunch of Americans,
bringing their American dollars? Hear now, the Per-due company want to ‘annex’ the next lot over from
theirs. They say they need it for truck turn arounds. Maybe they do. But Mister Barney grows food on
that lot, keeps hogs. You think the Per-due company gone pay him what it will cost him to up and move
someplace else? Shoot no! They gone just take it; and throw a sack of pennies at him, that’s all.Win a dinner with Alan Greenspan!
ALAN:
To your point about American emigration, America remains the beacon to world’s smartest and most
innovative talent. The best and the brightest from all over the world can have more opportunity here to
follow their dreams. That’s why they still come here. For Americans to forsake that dynamism would be
to forego our inherited legacy of progress and economic mobility.
WILLIE:
Ain’t nobody economically mobile or dynamically innovative in Ahoskie. Just poor folks, that can’t get no
help no how.
ALAN:
Your pessimism about your opportunity for wealth creation is, frankly, disappointing. Investment
opportunities abound, from real estate to equity exposure, small business entrepreneurship and
revenue generating assets.
WILLIE:
Oh, ok. If you already got a dollar, you could make another dollar. I see.
ALAN:
Consider this, Willie. Think about a Coke machine. If you bought a Coke machine and put it in the plant,
kept it stocked with sodas, that machine will make money for you all day and all night, while you are not
even there. You stock it up, take out the money, and let it get back to work. That is using credit to
purchase the asset which generates income. When the credit is paid off, everything is profit, 24 hours a
day. But you will want to borrow more money to put in more machines, at more places in the plant, or
maybe at other factories. That’s how you grow.
WILLIE:
But they already got Coke machines.
ALAN:
Something else then. The point is that the economy provides opportunity, to grow. Not just handouts.
WILLIE:
Mister Greenspan, I’m sure you right. You know all about these things. I just been poor my whole life
and it don’t seem like that’s ever going to end. Coke machines or not.
ALAN:
I can’t give you a straight answer about what you are looking for. I’m sorry.
WILLIE:
That’s alright, Mister Greenspan. You did what you could. You did your best. I know you are busy so I’ma
let you eat in peace.
WAITER:
(appearing with dinners) Are you leaving, sir?
WILLIE:
I best get on.Win a dinner with Alan Greenspan!
WAITER:
I would be happy to wrap this to go for you.
WILLIE:
Well, that would be real nice.
WAITER:
Just a moment.
WILLIE:
Mister Greenspan, thank you for taking your time to educate me. And I got to tell you… they wasn’t no
contest. I made that up for your man. He believed me and told me where you was. I just came over. But
you real nice to me and I gone to tell folks that I had a real fine time talking about the whole world with
Mister Greenspan.
WAITER:
(appears with take-out) Here you go, sir.
ALAN:
Willie, I don’t know if I have the answers for what you want but consider this, in America there is
generally opportunity for everybody, but sometimes not for you. That’s how it goes.
WILLIE:
It just get tighter, don’t it.
ALAN:
Yup.
WILLIE:
Good night, sir. (exits)
ALAN:
(begins eating his soup)
(end)