In three chapters I study the formation of social networks, and the impact the structures that arise may have in various economic settings. First, I develop a model of social network formation with heterogeneous agents and incomplete information. The model predicts an equilibrium in which agents...

In this dissertation I examine a set of crucial topics in the political economy of international trade, with an emphasis on firm-level heterogeneity. The first chapter is an empirical study of the new trade theories in which firm heterogeneity and trade costs play central roles in shaping the...

This dissertation consists of two essays. The first essay is a study of strategic firm competition in a differentiated product environment. We develop a tractable spatial model of oligopolistic competition in which firms endogenously determine both franchise/product locations and prices....