Money in chess

[WBuchanan]

Got bored in the library, so decided to compile some data on variables for congresses going back to 2010.

Ran a regression (with dependent variable being number of entries in Open) and included prizefund, first prize, grading prizes, distance from central belt and number of titled players (FM/IM/GM only) as independent variables. Albeit with a small sample size (n=50), and probably missing plenty of variables, the statistically significant variables are the total prize fund (p<0.01) and the number of titled players (p<0.02). Either players entering opens care about the number of titled players; or the number of titled players is acting as a proxy for another factor.

Hi Jonathan. Interesting idea. Even if you had more data, how could you draw any conclusion regarding cause and effect though? Could be the other way around - presumably the titled players would care about the number of entries, prize money etc. Most likely there is an interdependence (with most people acting on their own experience of how big the tournament usually is) making them impossible to separate just using stats.

What did you get for the possible effect of the grading prizes? Although drawing a conclusion on this would be open to the same objection in that a larger entry with more titled players would create more of a need for the grading prizes.

Asking the players what makes them more likely to enter (titled and mortal) might shed some light (maybe such a survey has been done before?). Then again, it might not..
Cheers