If chess players are so smart why they are not millionaires/billionaires?

            Some famous soldier once said, "If you give me American soldiers, and German officers, I can take over the world".  It was Patton, or Eisenhower, or somebody.

@Talmapai:

Gossen's first law: the law of diminishing marginal utility, meaning that the first unit of consumption of a good or service yields more utility than the second and subsequent units, with a continuing reduction for greater amounts.

As the rate of commodity acquisition increases, marginal utility decreases. If commodity consumption continues to rise, marginal utility at some point may fall to zero, reaching maximum total utility. Further increase in consumption of units of commodities causes marginal utility to become negative; this signifies dissatisfaction.

For example:

1. beyond some point, further doses of antibiotics would kill no pathogens at all, and might even become harmful to the body.

2. to satiate thirst a person drinks water but beyond a point consumption of more water might make the person vomit, hence leading to diminishing marginal utility.

Would playing chess apply to Gossen's first rule? Perhaps at lower levels a unit of chess practice (say 1 hour) will return larger improvements in Elo and you will get better than a large percentage of the population, but the same hour spent practicing chess at a grandmaster level may barely affect Elo or make better than any other grandmaster. Does this count?

Once I understand Gossen's first law I work on his second. My apologies for the slow pace my mind works, my field is cell biology not mathematics, so your patience is appreciated.-ProfessorJames

I would start talking in german but probably you would not understand my Bayerisch.

Dont say that umntil you have seen my bayerisch! Its A. Phonetic, and B. my pronounciation is bad. 

Maybe he's planning to win the NCAA $Billion bracket that Warren Buffet is offering. 

Talmapai, would it be too imprudent to ask your background? I assume either faculty level mathematics Professor or perhaps sociology researcher, but of course may be well off base. My background is a cellular biology assistant Prof.  My field is interesting research, but is certainly distracts me from my chess... perhaps mathematics is more chess friendly?

Now there's a Very intriguing apparent conumdrum...  ;-D ... a real Zen koan, I think.  I shall ponder it for many months.

This is dumb. You're equating intelligence with money; if I have to explain why that is wrong, You're not worth explaining it to.

I figure billionaires could "buy" themselves a title....

Because millionares and billionares often inherit wealth and important social networks therefore intellegence is often less if not completelty a non-factor for them. i.e George Bush. 

But not the other way around.

(PaullHutchh) Because millionares and billionares often inherit wealth and important social networks therefore intellegence is often less if not completelty a non-factor for them. i.e George Bush....and they tell us, "You can do/be anything you want !" (well, do be do be do - sing me a song Sinatra) But they don't say is "Anyone can be a millionaire !"....because you can't. They do say anyone can start their own bizness - and they promote that. Don't listen to them. 'Cuz most will lose their hard-earned $  'cuz they get scammed, lied to, stolen from, or cheated. This is the most likeliest country to make yourself a millionaire from scratch. All other countries ?....no fair chance. And even here the odds are very long.

Most people don't know the difference between an opportunity when it comes to you and an opportunity that you're trying to create. And like everything else, let things come to you 'cuz everything begins with luck. So, don't go out hard-charging....you look like a fool who's wasting all your $ & energy.

It's tragic how few subscribe to get rich slow strategies.  They're by far the most reliable.

Offhand i don,t know who is the world,s richest man, but that doesn,t make him the smartest.

The Queen of England is very wealthy, so are most of the royals.

....and born n2 it. More power to them....and they have alot !

And Grobe's 100% right....Aesop's turtle & rabbit....Remember the rich want you to chance it....so they can outplay you and giggle. They don't want any competition ! Nothing strikes more fear into a wealthy person than another wealthy person. Why do you think they promote the chance it strategy ?

Or how about the "Put your $ in the stock market and leave it there" strategy ? So they can reduce their market swings/volatility. Do not play their game. Pull it all out when it's high and put it all back in when it drops - give it 2 months. Whatever you do, don't buy n2 that "average in" nonsense.

Well think about. If a GM is going to meet Magnus Carlsen, isnt that a terrifying stress situation. Like being send for execution? How to cope with that? 100 gram of Vodka?

I dont think to be a GM is only nice. Anyway Magnus isnt like Mike Tyson, he doesnt eat ears. But he is scary. Scary to the bone.

Its in the genes?

Crazy talk.  Don't try to time the market, it will burn you.  If you knew when it was high and when it was low you'd already be rich.

Dollar-cost average, it's by far the best "get rich slow" strtategy.  My contributions come right out of my bank account automatically on payday so that I don't even miss it.  Then, periodically (once or twice a year), rebalance your portfolio -- this forces you to sell high and buy low since the instruments that have become too big a portion of your portfolio have done so on the back of rising prices and those that have become too small a portion have done so by underperforming relative to the rest of your portfolio.  Shifting dollars from the former to the latter to rebalance your portfolio is selling high and buying low.

If you want to play and have a little more control, set aside a little mad money with the understanding that it's all at risk and might simply be lost.  Remember that stock prices are set by perception, so if the news is out the stock price already includes the speculative reaction and takes into account the performance outlook for the company.

Another naive sheeple........Ask yourself....Why would I put $ in a US stock market ("averaging in" is putting $ in the market) right now at all-time highs ?

You have just read/studied this 'sold to pauper' strategy without using any of your own creativity. You need to imagine yourself outside the dodecahedron....one-side for each 20% bull market run since WW2. We are in the 12th month of this 12th one. You decide to average-in high and tie your $ down....that doesn't take any imagination.

Today's key word is capitulation....it happens to a fool on both ends of a stock market.

It is high right now, but averaging in isn't a one time dump of dollars into the market, it's a persistent and repeated contriubution over many years.  The market swings, averaging in is the best strategy to both insulate yourself and take advantage of the swings while managing the risks associated with less reliable strategies like trying to time the market.