The airplane game, also known as the plane game, is a style of

pyramid scheme A pyramid scheme is a business model which, rather than earning money (or providing Return on investment, returns on investments) by sale of legitimate product (business), products to an end consumer, mainly earns money by recruiting new members ...

first recorded in the 1980s in North America and later Western Europe. The common version of the system involved joining an "airplane" by paying a "pilot" to become one of eight "passengers". Published in print edition as "'Plane Game' taking many for a big ride". Already on the airplane were four "flight attendants" who were a step ahead, and two "co-pilots" next in line behind the pilot, thus the new passenger is fourth in the hierarchy. Once a pilot collected $12,000 from passengers to retire, the group split into two "airplanes", with each co-pilot becoming the pilot of the new airplane, taking half the participants and promoting everyone a level. Bringing in new passengers sped up everyone's progression towards retiring as a pilot. However, the structure of the scheme results in a participant losing the entire payment unless 14 new participants join. The scheme had spread from

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

South Florida South Florida, sometimes colloquially shortened to SoFlo, is the Regions of the United States#Florida, southernmost region of the U.S. state of Florida. It is one of Florida's three most commonly referred to directional regions; the two others are ...

by early 1987, with police raiding meetings in all four states, and reports of more airplane schemes operating in

Dallas Dallas () is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of Texas metropolitan areas, most populous metropolitan area in Texas and the Metropolitan statistical area, fourth-most ...

. In

Miami-Dade County, Florida Miami-Dade County () is a County (United States), county located in the southeastern part of the U.S. state of Florida. The county had a population of 2,701,767 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the most populous coun ...

, at least one recruiting session was reported with 1,000 attendees. Though common versions at the time required passengers to pay $1,500 to receive $12,000 as a pilot, some airplanes were being run with $5,000 passengers and a $40,000 pilot payout.

Other names

The scheme has also gone by the names Concorde and Golden Galaxy with similar names for the steps. Cash Club, Victoria operated in the same way but with different amounts and the steps were renamed to "club member", "committee member", "vice-president", and "president". "Krona Klub" was a similar scheme with more complex payout rules, as was a so-called game variously called "Cosmic Adventure", "Flying Saucer", or "Flying Starship". Blessing Loom and 8-Ball Pyramid Schemes

Blessing Loom and 8-Ball Pyramid Schemes

The scheme resurfaced in 2020, conducted over

Instagram Instagram is an American photo sharing, photo and Short-form content, short-form video sharing social networking service owned by Meta Platforms. It allows users to upload media that can be edited with Social media camera filter, filters, be ...

and other social media platforms, going by a variety of names including Blessing Loom and Loom Game. In 2022, after receiving several complaints from the public, South Africa's Financial Sector Conduct Authority released an official warning to the public regarding The Prosperity Grid, saying that although it resembled a traditional ''

stokvel In South Africa, a stokvel is an invitation-only club of twelve or more people serving as a rotating credit union or saving scheme. Members contribute fixed sums of money to a central fund on a weekly, fortnightly or monthly basis. The name ''stokv ...

'' savings scheme, they considered its structure to be a pyramid scheme. Because pyramid schemes fall outside of the jurisdiction of the FSCA, the matter has been referred to other relevant regulators and authorities.

References

External links

* {{cite web , url=https://people.ucsc.edu/~rosewood/writing/essays/pyramidgames.htm , title=The Pyramid Game: It's a Lie, It's a Scam, and It Won't Work , author=Linda Rosewood Hooper , work=Linda Rosewood Hooper: Writings , type=personal website , accessdate=2017-04-10 , location=

Santa Cruz, California Santa Cruz (Spanish language, Spanish for "Holy Cross") is the largest city and the county seat of Santa Cruz County, California, Santa Cruz County, in Northern California. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the city population ...

, publisher=

University of California, Santa Cruz The University of California, Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz or UCSC) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Santa Cruz, California, United States. It is one of the ten campuses in the University of C ...

Originally written in Spring 1993. 1980s fads and trends Pyramid and Ponzi schemes 2020s fads and trends