Efficient allocation of scarce resources is one of the central themes in economics. The essays in this thesis approach two aspects of this problem. In the first essay I consider the problem of the efficient provision of a public good with congestion in a setting with asymmetric information....

Learning about an underlying uncertainty from observing the actions of other agents is a widespread phenomenon in many social interactions. This thesis looks different aspects of the phenomenon of informational cascades that results due to this social learning. The first essay theoretically...