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In The Myth of American Inequality: How Government Biases Policy Debate, which the Wall Street Journal named a best book of 2022, former United States Senator Phil Gramm, Robert Ekelund, and John Early challenge popular notions about income inequality and its effect on Americans.
The Myth of American Inequality shows “that the way we collect and report statistics has significantly overstated inequality and understated national well-being” and “that the explosion of transfer payments following the War on Poverty has caused a significant number of prime work-age persons to become detached from the economy. That disengagement from the world of work has denied them the opportunity to benefit from the extraordinary economic progress that has occurred in the last 50 years and is the largest single cause of income inequality in postwar America” (167–68).
At Hudson, Senator Gramm and Hudson President and CEO John P. Walters will discuss how economic statistics suggest cohesion rather than divergence among Americans, and why this cohesion is likely to continue.
President-elect Donald Trump will bring a new agenda and a different approach to the United States’ alliances compared to the outgoing Biden administration. How should the second Trump administration balance US national security interests while building on Washington’s strong alliance with the Republic of Korea (ROK)? The two governments recently “reaffirmed the shared vision, common values, and unwavering commitment to their combined defense posture and the Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT) as the bedrock of our security partnership.” On the other hand, President Trump will face growing security cooperation among North Korea, Russia, China, and Iran as he begins his second tenure.
While the North Korean nuclear problem is once again a central security challenge, South Korean leaders hold diverse views about how to enhance extended deterrence. There is also considerable debate in Seoul about how the ROK should modernize its military capabilities, manage Korea’s relationship with China, support peace and security in maritime Asia (including the Taiwan Strait), and deepen cooperation with Japan, the Philippines, Australia, and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
Join Hudson for keynote remarks and an expert panel discussion on Korean policy challenges and priorities as well as ways the next US administration can minimize policy disruptions during the transition and find further strategic convergence with the ROK.
The next four years of American foreign policy will be crucial. From Afghanistan to Ukraine to Israel, the Biden administration failed to fulfill its commitments, and China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea have seized on this opportunity to increase their collaboration. America’s global allies and partners have looked on nervously as this axis of authoritarians developed into a major threat to the American-led world order.
Distinguished Fellow Mike Gallagher will join Palantir Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar and Senior Fellows Peter Rough and Nadia Schadlow to discuss what to expect from the second Trump administration and how Washington can change course by returning to hard-power principles and reasserting American dominance on the world stage.
Geopolitical uncertainty and a looming United States election formed the backdrop for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s July summit in Washington, DC. The gathering marked the third summit since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Burden sharing, support for Ukraine, and deterring Russian aggression, main topics of the previous two summits, remained front and center this year. But the Washington summit also discussed growing concern over China, NATO’s cooperation with Indo-Pacific allies, and Russia’s mounting hybrid attacks.
More than 100 days later, Hudson experts will discuss how successful the alliance has been in implementing key decisions made at the 2024 summit. How does NATO’s support package for Ukraine look in light of the shifting dynamics on the ground in recent months? What do new NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte’s priorities tell us? How could the outcome of the US presidential election impact NATO? What are the opportunities and pitfalls for transatlantic relations in the near future?
Some Canadian pundits argue that structural trends in the United States’ domestic politics, which in turn influence US foreign policy, create disproportionate risks for Canada. They suggest that Ottawa needs to be more deliberate about its relationship with Washington to avoid being left out in the cold. However, for a quarter century, Canadian politicians have gone against US policy on irregular migration, trade, Arctic security, North Atlantic Treaty Organization posture, and more. Can the United States still rely on Canada as a full partner in shaping the twenty-first century?
Join Senior Fellow Matt Boyse for a conversation with Distinguished Professor Christian Leuprecht of the Royal Military College of Canada, Queen’s University, and the Macdonald-Laurier Institute. They will take stock of the US-Canada relationship and evaluate its implications for security and prosperity in North America, the Euro-Atlantic, and the Indo-Pacific.
Journalist Edward Wong’s new memoir At the Edge of Empire: A Family’s Reckoning explores the intersection of family, identity, and the rise of China as a global power in the current geopolitical landscape.
The book covers the Wong family’s journey from rural China to urban America amid shifting United States–China relations and Wong’s experiences as a New York Times correspondent in Beijing. The family witnessed the transformation of China into an authoritarian regime and global empire—including the plight of the Uyghurs, as Wong’s father moved from Hong Kong to Xinjiang in the early years of Mao Zedong’s rule.
Join Hudson for a discussion of the book with Wong, Japan Chair Kenneth Weinstein, and Senior Fellow Nury Turkel.
Beyond merely guiding Americans to their destinations, the Global Positioning System is essential to the United States’ electricity grid, financial markets, and wireless networks. First responders rely on GPS to locate individuals in distress. Many US military systems rely on the position, navigation, and timing (PNT) functions of GPS, and systems similar to GPS have been central to new forms of warfare such as drones and precision guided munitions.
But current US GPS technology is 51 years old and grows increasingly fragile as new, more resilient American GPS satellites sit idle in warehouses. Hostile nations such as Iran and Russia frequently spoof GPS so that ships mistake their actual location. Airline pilots encounter GPS jamming in many parts of the world, especially near the Russia-Ukraine border. Perhaps worse, the US has no robust backup to GPS, which could prove catastrophic in a military conflict or a natural disaster.
To explain the challenges facing GPS and how Washington can solve them, Hudson will host an event with several leading authorities on the system.
Former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris offer vastly different visions of United States foreign policy, particularly toward the Middle East. What are the key distinctions in their approaches? What are the implications of the upcoming election for US allies in the region? And how might each candidate alter the US-Israel relationship?
For a discussion of these questions, join Research Fellow Zineb Riboua, Senior Fellow Michael Doran, and Executive Director of the Alexander Hamilton Society Gabriel Scheinmann.
Latin America’s authoritarian regimes have evolved, and so have their methods of controlling their societies and silencing dissent. Autocrats in the region are increasing their use of arbitrary detention and imprisonment, deploying new forms of transnational repression, and adopting a range of technologies, often in cooperation with other authoritarian regimes or criminal organizations.
These new, increasingly effective forms of repression leave dissidents, journalists, and other democratic actors in perilous situations, stifling efforts to mobilize citizens. Moreover, the United States and other democracies have not kept up with the autocrats’ expanding playbook, so outside efforts to support democratic movements are often at a significant disadvantage.
Join Hudson Adjunct Fellow Daniel Batlle for a conversation with Nicaraguan democracy leader and Freedom House Trustee Félix Maradiaga to examine how today’s autocrats exert control and why democracies need new tactics to support democratic leaders in the region.
The United States is in a new cold war with two nuclear-armed adversaries—Russia and China—that regularly threaten to cross the nuclear threshold to break the US-led international order.
In her new book Duty to Deter: American Nuclear Deterrence and the Just War Doctrine, Hudson Senior Fellow Rebeccah L. Heinrichs makes the case that, in the current threat environment, strengthening the US nuclear deterrent complies with just war doctrine. Contrary to the arguments of many experts, failing to adapt the American nuclear deterrent would violate the doctrine’s principles, she argues.
Heinrichs will join Jeremy Hunt, a Hudson media fellow and the chairman of the Board of Directors of Veterans on Duty, to discuss the ethical implications of US nuclear policy and how policymakers can fulfill the moral imperative for a strong American nuclear deterrent.
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