“Small, yet Beautiful”

Subhasish M. Chowdhury, Sang-Hyun Kim

OAI: oai:purehost.bath.ac.uk:publications/0b687ce4-43ee-42d9-839a-2073c18d4334 • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geb.2017.05.012

We reconsider whether a grand multi-winner contest elicits more equilibrium effort than a collection of sub-contests. Fu and Lu (2009) employ a sequential winner-selection mechanism and find support for running a grand contest. We show that this result is completely reversed if a simultaneous winner-selection mechanism or a sequential loser-elimination mechanism is implemented. We then discuss the optimal allocation of players and prizes among sub-contests.

contest design multiple winner group-size selection mechanism