We measure the persuasive effects of slanted news and tastes for like-minded news, exploiting cable channel positions as exogenous shifters of cable news viewership. Channel positions do not correlate with demographics that predict viewership and voting, nor with local satellite viewership. We estimate that Fox News increases Republican vote shares by 0.3 points among viewers induced into watching 2.5 additional minutes per week by variation in position. We then estimate a model of voters who select into watching slanted news, and whose ideologies evolve as a result. We use the model to assess the growth over time of Fox News influence, to quantitatively assess media-driven polarization, and to simulate alternative ideological slanting of news channels. (JEL D72, L82)

We measure how the bundling of television channels affects short-run welfare. We estimate an industry model of viewership, demand, pricing, bundling, and input-market bargaining using data on ratings, purchases, prices, bundles, and input costs. We conduct simulations of à la carte policies that require distributors to offer individual channels for sale to consumers. We estimate that negotiated input costs rise by 103.0 percent under à la carte. These higher input costs offset consumer benefits from purchasing individual channels. Mean consumer and total surplus change by an estimated —5.4 to 0.2 percent and —1.7 to 6.0 percent, respectively. (JEL D12, L11, L51, L82, M31)