Hello and welcome to the 538 Politics Podcast. I'm Gailan Drook.

Local news is disappearing from many parts of the United States. Since 2004, about 1800

local newspapers have closed. In just the 11 years from 2008 to 2019, the percentage

of people who said they got their news from local papers fell from 40% to 19%. During

that same period of time, newsroom employment also halved.

And Americans largely aren't aware of this dynamic. In 2018, 71% of Americans told Pew

that their local news media was doing well financially. That's despite the fact that

only 14% said they had paid for local news in the past year.

Today, we're going to talk about what happens when local news goes away and we'll look

at it from two perspectives. Both the on the ground story of the decline of one local

paper and new research that suggests declining local news can contribute to decrease participation

in local government and increased polarization. Here with me to do that is staff writer at

the Atlantic Elaine Godfrey. Her latest story is called what we lost when Gennett came

to town. We don't often talk about how a paper's collapse makes people feel less connected,

more alone. Welcome Elaine.

Thanks for having me. Also, you're with us is political science professor at George

Washington University, Danny Hayes. His recent book is called News Hole, the demise of local

journalism and political engagement. Welcome, Danny. Oh, thanks for having me.

So let's begin with the numbers. This is 538. After all, Danny, the basis for your book

is an intense quantitative study looking at the decline of local coverage and its impact

on local communities. What did you find?

So my co-author Jennifer Lawless and I undertook a study for several years where we looked

...