For those who grew up with arcade classics, you probably remember screens like this:

The first screen is the continue screen. I saw this a lot. You start with a finite number of lives or hearts or whatever, and when you ran out the game was over. Except the game designers quickly learned that the punishment of losing all your progress when the game was over was too great. If you had to start over, people would give up. So they gave you the bare minimum you need to start again and let you continue.

the second screen is the beat the game screen. You’ve conquered every level and beat all the bosses. You have 999,999 points and there are no more digits on which to count your winnings. It was the ultimate satisfaction, and also the license to move on with your life. You had done it all.

The logic of video games were simple: you could keep winning until you reached the end, or you could lose, and use a continue to try again. There was a maximum score, after which you might as well play a different game.

That structure let us get really damn good at what we were doing, it maximized our enjoyment and sense of accomplishment and minimized our fear of failure. Game design has long understood the fundamentals of human nature, and has developed principles whose power works well beyond the pixelated walls of any game.

Right now we have economic inequality problems and power imbalances that are about the get exponentially worse. I think game design might point the way for a solution. What if we took that classic video game structure seriously—not just as nostalgia, but as a framework for a fairer and more resilient economy for the future?

The Structural Problem

We are entering an economic era shaped by artificial intelligence and extreme capital efficiency. A small number of individuals and corporations are going to be able to generate enormous wealth with relatively little labor input. The traditional mechanisms for income redistribution—progressive taxation, public services, and philanthropy—are proving insufficient against the accelerating tide of wealth concentration and its associated political power. With fewer people needed to produce more value, the gap between capital and labor is no longer going downhill—it’s going off a cliff.

Unchecked accumulation isn’t just economically inefficient; it’s politically destabilizing. When a handful of individuals wield more financial power than most nation-states and huge chunks of people are unable to provide economic security for their family, the democratic project itself comes under strain. On an economic level, the fear of falling into poverty discourages experimentation, entrepreneurship, and long-term thinking among those with less. Risk, in a system without safety nets, becomes something only the wealthy can afford.

The Proposal: A Game With End Conditions

The “Video Game Economy” proposes a rules-based approach to constrain economic extremes at both ends. It consists of four core mechanisms:

1. A Billion-Dollar Beat the Game Cap Individuals can accumulate up to $1 billion in net personal wealth. After that, additional wealth is redirected into structured public trusts—managed independently, democratically, or by non-profit stewards. These trusts could fund climate infrastructure, education, healthcare, or direct innovation grants. There could be a market for these trusts, each with their own purpose and goals, but all would be non-profit entities with the sole purpose of benefitting humankind. This cap also limits the transformation of economic success beyond the cap into outsized, systemic influence.
2. A Continue Mechanism If a person’s net assets fall below a defined threshold—say, poverty-level income with no access to housing or health care, relative to their locality—they receive a reset: debts cleared, access to basic housing, job placement support, and healthcare coverage. This reduces the permanent consequences of failure, allowing more people to re-enter the economic game.
3. Balanced Power By limiting excessive wealth accumulation and providing structured support for those at the bottom, this system rebalances power toward groups and institutions rather than individuals. It preserves innovation without creating permanent hierarchies of influence.
4. Market Stabilization through Demand Constraints By capping extreme concentrations of personal wealth, the system may reduce inflationary pressure in key markets such as housing and energy. Ultra-wealthy individuals often deploy capital into finite or speculative assets—buying multiple properties, investing in land, or influencing commodity markets. Limiting this demand could produce subtle, deflationary effects—especially when paired with stronger supply-side policy. While this won’t solve market distortions alone, it could help ease asset bubbles and reduce price volatility.

Theoretical Foundations and Implications

This model is informed by and adjacent to several established economic frameworks: