Play the forces that built the modern economy.
Learn economics by doing — set prices in a working market, steer a country through a recession, trade commodities across four centuries of world history, or test yourself against the quiz library.
Four ways to think like an economist.
Every game has an easy mode for beginners and an advanced mode with real historical parameters. Pick a lane.
The Price Maker
Run a lemonade stand in 1890s New York. Balance supply and demand curves, find the market-clearing price, and watch your surplus and shortage in real time.
Recession Navigator
You're the Treasury Secretary in 1930, 1979, or 2008. Make policy calls under real historical conditions and see whether your choices shorten the downturn or deepen it.
Trade Routes
Buy silk in Canton, sell spices in Amsterdam, and follow the actual price gradients that fueled the Age of Sail. Comparative advantage in your hand.
The Quiz Library
Four branches — macro, micro, economic history, and personal finance — at beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels. Nearly 100 questions with explanations.
Textbooks tell. Games show.
Economics is a system of forces. Reading about a supply curve isn't the same as pushing it and seeing what breaks.
Play the model, not the definition
Every game is a working simulation. Change one input, and the whole system responds — the way a real economist would test intuition.
Anchored in real history
Scenarios use NBER business-cycle data, actual policy responses, and historical price gradients. You're not playing hypotheticals — you're playing 1930.
Two difficulties, one page
Easy mode teaches the concept with generous hints. Advanced mode strips them away and lets you break things — the fastest way to actually learn.
Bite-sized, replayable
Each game runs 3-8 minutes. Perfect between classes, on a commute, or as a warm-up before a longer video from One Small Step History.
A history channel with a curious streak.
Small Step Econ is the games arm of One Small Step History — a media project about the small decisions that reshape the world. Economics is where those decisions get their teeth. Playing them is how we make them stick.
One email a month. New games first.
A short dispatch from Small Step Econ & One Small Step History: new games and quizzes, the history behind them, and an occasional deep dive. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.