Essays in Microeconomic Theory

Abstract

This dissertation consists of three self-contained essays in microeconomic theory. The first chapter examines how pre-election polls affect the election outcome through the voters’ participation decision and studies the resulting incentives that arise for the poll participants. The second chapter, which is joint work with Tobias Rachidi, compares two search technologies—evaluating one or multiple candidates at a time in each time period—in a committee search framework in terms of welfare and acceptance standards. The third chapter analyzes the equilibria of three-candidate plurality-rule elections in a costly voting framework, revisiting Duverger’s law.