Planet Money - The story of "Monopoly" and American capitalism

Episode Date: January 26, 2023

Monopoly is one of the best-selling board games in history. The game's staying power may in part be because of strong American lore — the idea that anyone, with just a little bit of cash, can rise from rags to riches. Mary Pilon, author of The Monopolists: Obsession, Fury, and the Scandal Behind the World's Favorite Board Game.But there's another origin story – a very different one that promotes a very different image of capitalism. (And with two sets of starkly different rules.) That story shows how a critique of capitalism grew from a seed of an idea in a rebellious young woman's mind into a game legendary for its celebration of wealth at all costs. This episode was made in collaboration with NPR's Throughline. For more about the origin story of Monopoly, listen to their original episode Do Not Pass Go. This episode was produced by Emma Peaslee, mastered by Natasha Branch, and edited by Jess Jiang. The Throughline episode was produced by Rund Abdelfatah, Ramtin Arablouei, Lawrence Wu, Laine Kaplan-Levenson, Julie Caine, Victor Yvellez, Anya Steinberg, Yolanda Sangweni, Casey Miner, Cristina Kim, Devin Katayama, and Amiri Tulloch. It was fact-checked by Kevin Volkl and mixed by Josh Newell.Subscribe to Planet Money+ in Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org/planetmoneyLearn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

This is Planet Money, from NPR. Okay, the name of the game is Monopoly. Do you all know how to play the game? No. No. What? I think that we should review the rules. No, I know the game, don't worry. I tried playing Monopoly with my nephews recently.

Hello, I'm Ali. I'm Zaid. I'm Taha. And they had a lot of questions. Wait, we can steal? What do they mean by mortgage? No, no, no, you can't steal. I'm Taha. And they had a lot of questions. Wait, we can steal? What do they mean by mortgage? No, no, no, you can't steal. Well, how much is the rent? Questions that feel much bigger than a board game. There are the obvious things Monopoly teaches you,

how to negotiate, how to manage your cash flow, how to diversify your assets, like owning homes and hotels. And then there are the implicit things. The idea that anyone with just a little bit of cash can rise from rags to riches in this country. This rags to riches narrative is even part of the game's origin story. At one point, this story was included in every box of Monopoly. That a man named Charles Darrow was unemployed

and came up with a game to pass the time. In 1934, he brought Monopoly to the game company, Parker Brothers, hoping to make some money off of it. He became a millionaire. But there's another origin story, a very different one, that promotes a very different image of capitalism. Hello and welcome to Planet Money. I'm Amanda Aronchik. And I'm Randa Abidfattah. Rund is one of the hosts of NPR's Throughline podcast. Today on the show, how a critique of capitalism grew from a seed of an idea in a rebellious young woman's mind into a game legendary for its celebration of wealth, no matter the cost.

the cost. For this episode, we are going to hand over the mic to Rund and to her co-host at ThruLined, Ramteen Arabloui, to tell us the fraught origin story of this famous board game. It's 1879 in a small town in Illinois where 13-year-old Lizzie McGee is curled up next to the fire with a book her father gave her. Progress and Poverty by Henry George. Lizzie had to stop going to school. Her family was struggling, never having recovered from the recession six years earlier. And as she dives into this book, the world begins to make a little more sense to her. The great cause of inequality in the distribution of wealth is inequality in the ownership of land. The ownership of land is the great fundamental fact which ultimately determines the social, the political, and consequentially the intellectual and moral condition of people.

Henry George is pretty much the equivalent of a rock star. of people. Henry George is pretty much the equivalent of a rock star. He'd started forming his ideas about the pitfalls of extreme wealth while traveling around the world to places like Australia and India. What is the current explanation of the hard times? Overproduction. There are so many clothes that men must go ragged, so much coal that in the bitter winters people have to shiver, such overfilled granaries that people actually die by starvation. Want due to overproduction? Was a greater absurdity ever uttered? How can there be overproduction till all have enough? It's really important to understand that in the United States after the Civil War at this time, there was an incredible amount of wealth being created that hadn't been seen in this country anymore.

And you had a handful of people who were controlling it. Mary Pilon is a journalist who covers sports and business. She wrote a book about the history of Monopoly. And George is asking questions about all this money is now coming in. Our country was ripped apart and now it's, you know, we're rebuilding. And how does that distribute it? And what is the government's role in, you know, taking a cut?

Or, you know, how does that pan out? A growing number of Americans were fed up with the monopolies of the so-called Gilded Age. Railroad, sugar, oil, and the growing riches of the elite few, the Vanderbilts, Carnegies, and Rockefellers. The vicious, the ignorant, and Rockefellers. The vicious, the ignorant, and the millionaires.

Lizzie's dad, James McGee, a staunch progressive who traveled with Abraham Lincoln during the Lincoln-Douglas debates, strongly backed the ideas of Henry George. We cannot shut our eyes to the fact that all over the country there is a feeling of restlessness He understood that wealth and owning land were deeply connected. Whoever owned the land made the profits and maintained all the power. And he made sure that his daughter, Lizzie, knew it too. Not just by giving her books, but by encouraging her to live a life that transcended the societal norms of the time. And she did. Professionally, she got a job as a stenographer. She dabbled in engineering and invented a whole new tool for stenography, which she went and got patented under her name.

So she was absolutely a trailblazer. Throughout all her adventures, Lizzie kept going back to the ideas of Henry George, to the book her father gave her all those years ago. She became friends with Henry George's son and became the secretary of the Women's Single Tax Club of Washington, a club dedicated to advancing George's central theory on how to solve inequality. As I say, the man that owns the land is the master of those who must live on it. So the single tax theory, the general idea was that you had a land value tax, also known as a single tax. And the general idea is to tax land and only land. So then that shifts the tax burden to wealthy landlords. Anybody who lives in New York or Los Angeles or a high rent neighborhood, I'm sure,

is kind of nodding your head at that. And that message really resonated with Americans in the late 1800s because, you know, this is at a time when poverty and squalor are very much on display in urban centers. And that's part of why I think he had such a big audience. And they sometimes called themselves the anti-monopolists. Those were people who wanted to break apart monopolies, break apart these, you know, concentrations of power, whether it's railroads, banking, monopolies, break apart these concentrations of power, whether it's railroads, banking, steel, and this continues on and on. The monopoly of the land gone, there need be no fear of large fortunes, for when everyone gets what he fairly earns, no one can get more than he fairly earns.

How many men are there who fairly earn a million dollars? It's about income inequality. It's about how do we tax people? How are the wealthy treated? What are we doing for those who are in poverty? Henry George died in 1897, but his followers made sure his ideas would live on. And as for Lizzie McGee,

she turned to the latest fad to get his message across. Board games. Around this time, Americans were getting really into board games, like the Game of Life. Yes, the Game of Life that's still around today, but not quite the same. I'm a millionaire! Be a winner at the Game of Life!

From Milton Bradley. The Game of Life had been around for a while at that point. That was a game that was published by Milton Bradley. And the Game of Life had been around for a while at that point. That was a game that was published by Milton Bradley. And The Game of Life is, the original version, is very dark. It's very much about teaching kids about the morality of the world. Mary writes that the board had an intemperance space that led to poverty, a government contract space that led to wealth,

and a gambling space that led to ruin. The game these days has almost none of that. But it still imparts a particular message of what one should expect out of life. A car, a job, a marriage, kids, and a house. With the single tax theory in mind, Lizzie McGee invented what she called the Landlord's Game, the very first version of Monopoly. She gets her patent for the Landlord's Game, which is Monopoly, in 1904. It's striking how

similar it is to what we know as Monopoly today. You've got the railroads. Obviously, you don't have cars quite the same way. So we don't have free parking, but you have park, which again, Obviously, you don't have cars quite the same way, so we don't have free parking, but you have park, which again, parks and land is a huge deal for Georgias. And you have properties, and you go around and around. The object of the game is to obtain as much wealth or money as possible. When a player stops upon a lot owned by another player, he must pay the rent to the owner. The player who has the largest sum total is the winner. But there is one major difference from the Monopoly game we all know and play today.

When Lizzie creates the game, she makes two rule sets. She makes a monopolist rule set and an anti-monopolist rule set. The anti-monopolist version rewarded every player when wealth was created. All for one, one for all kind of thing. While the monopolist set rewarded individual players who created monopolies to crush opponents. And the monopolist rule set is the version that ends up kind of taking hold among progressives. It was played by a who's who of left-wing America. It was played at several Ivy League schools. It was played by Scott Neering, who was a famous socialist professor at Wharton.

And it was played by Upton Sinclair himself, who obviously, you know, the jungle is very much a, you know, kind of the quintessential muckraking critique of a lot of what is going on in the country at the time. It spread like wildfire and the game started to change depending on where you played. People localized the boards and made them their own. So if you were playing in Boston, you would have the commons on there. If you were playing in New York, you would have Broadway. If you were in Chicago, you would have the loop. So she is very much about, you know, creating a game that has kind of these core ingredients, these core rules and instructions, but also encourages people to, you know, in terms of the tokens, use what you have around the house, make the game your own. And that's pretty interesting, right? And that's very different than what we kind of think of as games now,

which is like you go to a mass market, a big box retailer, or you buy it online and they all come the same. She, you know, games at that time, mass manufacturing wasn't quite the same as it is now. So she also kind of cooks into this idea of making it your own. With people inventing their own hometown versions of the game, cash wasn't exactly pouring into Lizzie's bank account. She wasn't making money off the patent.

And she wasn't getting known. But the game sure was, being played and reinterpreted everywhere. In the 1930s, Atlantic City was the place for summer vacation. It was known for its nightlife. At the same time, it was home to a sizable Quaker community, who were maybe not so into all the vice, but were really into Monopoly. The game was gripping, fun, and a social event that drew friends together. A Quaker family based in Atlantic City began to share and make copies of their homemade board based on their neighborhood with friends and even local hotels.

It was spreading, and there were even spin-offs. And one of the people who gets exposed to the game is a man named Charles Darrow. Charles Darrow was a self-described practical engineer from Philadelphia, a city not far from Atlantic City. A lot of people were coming and going from Atlantic City and Philadelphia at the time. One day, Darrow's wife Esther runs into her old friend Charles Todd. They'd gone to Quaker school together, but had lost touch. They make plans to have dinner with their spouses, really fun night.

And after dinner, Charles Todd suggests they come to his house sometime. Hey, why don't you come over and we'll have a Monopoly night? So they come over, they play the game, and then later Darrow asks Todd, hey, that game was really fun. Can you type up the rules for me?

When we come back, Charles Darrow takes the game and runs. We left off with Charles Darrow learning to play Monopoly with Charles Todd, who learned in Atlantic City. After that game, Darrow asks Todd to type up the rules. And Todd thinks this is really weird because at this point the game's been around for 30 years or so. But he does it anyway. Darrow then takes those rules and starts redesigning the board. He has a cartoonist friend help him with illustrations. He starts marketing it a little bit.

And eventually, he pitches the game to big game companies Milton Bradley and Parker Brothers. And he claims that he invented it. Milton Bradley and Parker Brothers weren't impressed and turned him down. Parker Brothers weren't impressed and turned them down. Parker Brothers wrote back, Dear Mr. Darrow, our new games committee has carefully considered the game which you so kindly sent in to us for examination. While the game no doubt contains considerable merit, we do not... They basically thought it was too complicated.

But a few months later, they came back and said, wait, we do want it. And maybe they did. Or maybe they needed it. Parker Brothers is a company that is on the brink of destruction, like many companies. There had just been a handover, George Parker, hands over the reins to his son-in-law, Robert Barton. And they need a hit and they need it fast. And so they started selling Monopoly.

And they're just as surprised as anybody that this game sells like gangbusters. Monopoly, the great financial game, is sweeping the country because it appeals to every American's love of bargain and business dealing. Give a Monopoly party and guests will want to play all night. And something really interesting happens then too, which is that Charles Darrow becomes part of the marketing of the game. At the time my brainchild was born, I was far more thoroughly unemployed than I even like to imagine now. Not only unemployed from a financial point of view, but a morale point of view.

I simply had to have something to do. Nobody used to care who invented games, right? It's not like, oh, I'm going to buy a book because it's by a certain author, or see a movie because it has a certain star. But Darrow's Cinderella story, this fabricated notion that he goes into his basement and he's unemployed and trying to support his family

and innovates and has this eureka light bulb moment and creates this massive bestseller of a game, that is such a romantic story, even if it's not true. So the Darrow story captivates the country, as does the game. In some ways, it was the story the country needed at that time. The richest country in the world began a bitter journey downhill. The stock market buckled and crashed, and the nation's economy plummeted into the Depression. Jobs were scarce, poverty was rampant, and hope was hard to come by. By 1932,

nearly one man out of four was unemployed. But here was this guy and this game keeping the so-called American dream alive. Charles Darrow does all these interviews, all these photo shoots where, you know, he's telling this Cinderella story. And they start to put it in the game itself. It's tucked in. It was tucked in the game I played. It was 1934, the height of the Great Depression, when Charles B. Darrow of Germantown, Pennsylvania,

showed what he called the Monopoly game to the executives at Parker Brothers. And becomes part of theantown, Pennsylvania, showed what he called the Monopoly game to the executives at Parker Brothers. And becomes part of the romance of the story, too. In its first year, 1935, the Monopoly game was the best-selling game in America. The rest, as they say, is history. If you think about the news industry, when you get an error and it gets picked up everywhere, it's very hard to course correct that, right?

So especially back then, this is obviously way, way before the internet. So the story is all over the place. And Lizzie McGee catches wind of it. And she does not take this quietly. She calls up reporters with the Washington Evening Star and the Washington Post. And she does these interviews where she is holding up her games. She says, I have patents. I made this game. I conceived of the game of landlord to interest people in the single tax plan of the great economist Henry George.

Parker Brothers catches wind of Lizzie's noise. They get in touch and offer her $500 for the patent to the landlord's game, which is roughly $10,000 today. $500 for the patent to the Landlords Game, which is roughly $10,000 today. George Parker is on the verge of retirement, but to make this deal, he pays Lizzie a personal visit. And she's excited at first because she thinks, wow, my ideas, my idea. Henry George is long dead, but like my game and my invention is going to be out there and Parker Brothers is going to publish it. This is amazing. and my invention is going to be out there and Parker Brothers is going to publish it.

This is amazing. Two days after the agreement was signed, Lizzie sent a note to Parker Brothers. Farewell, my beloved brainchild. I regretfully part with you, but I am giving you to another who will be able to do more for you than I have done. I shall do all I can to add to your success and fame,

which will, in some measure, add to my own. I charge you do not swerve from your high purpose and ultimate mission. Remember, the world expects much from you. But there's no evidence they acknowledged her, really, as the inventor at all. And the Darrow story has taken hold. It is all over the place. Which is good and bad for Darrow's story has taken hold. It is all over the place. Which is good and bad for Darrow. Because people who had been playing the game for decades at this point

see this story being spun about this new game called Monopoly invented by Charles Darrow, and they're like, huh? People start to write into Parker Brothers, and they're like, this guy didn't run the game. Even Charles Todd, the person who taught Darrow how to play and wrote down the rules for him, wrote to Parker Brothers in disgust at Darrow's charade. Darrow didn't have anything to do with originating the game. He stole it.

But his letter went unanswered. Parker Brothers doubled down on Darrow's Cinderella story. As for Lizzie McGee? Of all the hats she wore, of all the things that she did, she was a receptionist, she was a writer, she was a stenographer. She lists her occupation as maker of games, and her income is zero. She dies in 1948 with this itty-bitty little obituary that you have to really look for. There wasn't a single mention of Monopoly in her obituary. And Charles Darrow gets, like, the New York Times treatment,

hailing him as the inventor when he passes, you know, decades later. Charles B. Darrow, who became a millionaire by inventing the game Monopoly, died at his Bucks County, Pennsylvania home yesterday at the age of 78. So they have very, very different fates as a result of what happens in the 1930s. And that could have been the end. Lizzie forgotten and Charles Darrow's false history living on. A very bleak finale to Lizzie's anti-capitalist monopoly.

But Mary Pilon sees another legacy. The signs were everywhere, but now it's official we are in a recession. 27% drop in the number of homes sold last month compared to June. 27%. That is terrible news. But the question now, when will it end? It started in 2011, after the global financial crisis. The housing market had plummeted. The stock market was at its lowest since the Great Depression.

And many people were fed up. Around the time I started getting interested in the story, Occupy Wall Street was something that I was covering. It's our duty as Americans to fight for our country and to keep it, you know, true to serving its people. And when it doesn't do that, it's immoral not to stand up and say something. And the Mr. Monopoly icon became, you know, very much used and loved by protesters as a critique of capitalism. And I thought, okay, now we've come full circle. Now, like, Monopoly and its iconography has become this, like, you know, symbol of Wall Street excess and things. And I think Lizzie would be proud of that. That was Mary Pilon. Her book is called The Monopolis, Obsession, Fury, and the Scandal Behind the World's Favorite Board Game.

go from ThruLine. And since they took over the episode today, we are going to throw to them to finish the credits. I'm Randa Abdel-Fattah. I'm Ramteen Arablui. This episode was produced by me. And me and... Lawrence Wu. Lane Kaplan-Levinson. Julie Kane.

Victor Ibeez. Anya Steinberg. Yolanda Sanguini. Casey Miner. Christina Kim. Devin Katayama. Amiri Tala. Fact-checking for this episode was done by Kevin Vocal.

Thank you to Mansi Khurana, Steve Drummond, Lane Kaplan-Levinson, Devin Miller, Victory Veaz, Dan Boyce, Alyssa Nadwarni, Joseph Haas, and Adam Gold for their voiceover work. Thanks also to Tamar Charney and Anya Grunman. And a special thanks to my nephews Z Zaid, Taha, and Ali, for playing Monopoly with me. This episode was mixed by Josh Newell. Music for this episode was composed by Ramtin and his band, Drop Electric, which includes...

Navid Marvi. Sho Fujiwara. Anya Mizani. Thanks for listening. And a special thanks to our funder, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, for helping to support this podcast.