Gaming the National Debt

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Two policy makers in Washington, D.C. have teamed up to create a video game about the nation’s national debt, which is $62 trillion if you include promised payments like Social Security and Medicare, according to the game's creators.

“Most people don’t think the national debt will have an impact on their day-to-day lives,” said Nicola Moore, 27, the assistant director of economic policy at the Heritage Foundation.

Not counting entitlement payments, the national deficit came in at a record $1.42 trillion in 2009, according to USA Today, which was more than triple the record set the previous year. The current debt level is $13 trillion, Moore said. The game is meant to raise awareness about the national debt, which is “the most important issue of this generation,” Moore said.

Realizing a research paper would probably go ignored, she brainstormed with Eric Heis, 29, who does education policy for the University of Phoenix, on how to educate young people about the issue.

Heis suggested creating an interactive game online. “When Nicola and I first started talking about ways to reach young people, the Facebook apps Mafia Wars and Farmville were really popular,” Heis said. “We thought, why not create a game that takes people five or ten minutes to play at their desk that gets them interested in the budget, too.”

Combining video games and policy isn't a new idea, but it can be a powerful way to capture the attention of the younger demographic. A Neilson study showed people tend to spend more time playing online games than checking their email, Moore said. In the game “Oiligarchy” on Addictinggames.com, for example, players drill oil wells all over the world to make a profit and keep up with energy demands. Players are continuously making decisions, such as whether or not to raid Iraq, pay off politicians or end the oil lobby, and then grappling with the repercussions. Since it was launched in October 2008, it has been played nearly five million times, according to Addictinggames.com. 

In Heis and Moore's game, titled, “U.O.Me,” players have to make choices on how they will pay off their $200,000 portion of the national debt. They can choose to raise the age Social Security kicks in or eliminate welfare. But each action has a consequence. If you raise the social security age, you’ll have to fight an AARP monster. If you take away welfare, homeless people will start populating your streets. The game will also integrate with Facebook, and players will be able to post status updates about the budget balancing decisions they make.

“We don’t want people to play once and say I won,” Heis said. “We want people to play multiple times and see what options are out there.”

The game is still in development. Moore did all the research and number crunching for the game and Heis is creating the scripts for how the different scenarios can play out. To date, they have created a trailer and website, and the pair is now soliciting donations so that they can hire programmers to make U.O.Me.

Even without a game to play just yet, U.O.Me is attracting attention. It recently won "Game Under Development Most Likely to Succeed" at the Constitutional Convention: Building Democracy 2.0, which was co-sponsored by the National Conference on Citizenship and mobilize.org and held in Philadelphia, Pa.

“I hope it gives players enough sense about the scope of the debt problem that when they see a news story about it, they are comfortable enough with the issue to read it and take interest in it,” Moore said.