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Hoover Daily Report | May 15, 2026 · Hoover Daily Report

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  Welcome to "the Hoover Daily Report". Ideas Advancing
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  Freedom. It's Friday, May 15th, twenty twenty six .
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  This Friday, Hoover celebrates renowned economist John B. Taylor with a new book
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  examining his impactful and multifaceted career; Joshua Rauh speaks with House
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  members about the urgency of improving America’s fiscal situation; and a new
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  book by Rose Gottemoeller pushes back on revisionist narratives to remind readers
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  that following the Cold War, the United States and Russia successfully
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  collaborated on a number of important security issues.
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  Honoring John B. Taylor’s Contributions to Economics and Monetary Policy.
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  Few have had an impact on the world of economics and monetary policy equal to
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  that of John B. Taylor. A professor of economics at Stanford University and a
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  Hoover Institution Senior Fellow Emeritus, Taylor has made influential
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  contributions in monetary policy, public service, and academia across five
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  decades. A Celebration Honoring John B. Taylor’s Contributions to Economics and
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  Monetary Policy is based on a conference held May 8, 2025, at the Hoover
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  Institution to honor Taylor’s life and career. Many of Taylor’s colleagues and
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  students past and present, other monetary experts, and family and friends came
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  together to pay tribute and share insightful anecdotes of his character and
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  dedication. Reflecting the conference proceedings, this volume shares the
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  presentations and vivid discussions around Taylor’s role as a leading
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  economist, from his development of the influential Taylor rule—an important tool
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  of monetary policy—to his laudable public service in the US Treasury and on the
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  Council of Economic Advisers under Presidents Ford, Carter, and George H. W.
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  Bush.
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  Reducing the National Debt by Tackling Waste, Fraud, and Overregulation.
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  Yesterday, Senior Fellow Joshua Rauh testified in front of the House
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  Subcommittee on Economic Growth, Energy Policy, and Regulatory Affairs, during a
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  roundtable on “Reducing America’s National Debt: Rooting Out Federal Waste,
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  Fraud, and Overregulation.” You can view today's online HDR for a video of the
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  roundtable.
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  Rauh argues that the federal budget is under
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  “severe immediate pressure,” with net interest outlays accounting for
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  25% of federal revenue (excluding Social Security revenue) last year.
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  Under current law, Rauh notes based on his research, this figure will grow
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  significantly over coming decades. To preserve spending and borrowing
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  flexibility in the event of a major crisis, Rauh says, the nation’s current
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  fiscal problems demand immediate and serious attention.
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  New Book Details How Washington and Moscow Forged a Framework for Security
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  After the Cold War.
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  A new book by Hoover Institution Research Fellow Rose Gottemoeller offers an
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  insider’s account of how leaders in Washington and the newly democratic
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  Russian government forged a working relationship that advanced international
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  security and cooperation in the years after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
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  In Security Through Cooperation: Space, Nuclear Weapons, and US-Russia Relations
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  after the Cold War, published this year by Stanford University Press,
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  Gottemoeller challenges the view held by some contemporary Russian officials and
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  commentators that the United States sought to weaken or isolate Russia during
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  the turbulent post-Soviet transition of the 1990s. According
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  to that narrative, the United States was primarily focused on expanding NATO and
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  undermining Russian influence.
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  Declining Industry and Public Trust at the Local Level: Elizabeth Elder on
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  America’s “Company Towns”.
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  The United States is a nation dotted with so-called “company towns,” or population
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  centers where a single business or industry dominates not only the local
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  economy but local government and the community ethos as well. But what happens
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  when a town and an industry in decline part ways, leaving it to local government
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  and civic leaders to take up the slack? On a new episode of Matters of Policy &
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  Politics, Hoover Fellow Elizabeth Elder discusses what has transpired in those
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  portions of America (particularly Appalachia and the Midwest) once
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  dominated by since-diminished industries, and the lack of institutional confidence
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  that followed.
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  The conversation builds on Elder’s interviews, polling, and data chronicled
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  in her new book, Company Towns: Industry Power and the Historical Foundations of
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  Public Mistrust.
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  Xi's “Thucydides Trap” Warning Is So 2010, Is China Out of New Ideas?
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  In an appearance yesterday on the RealClearPolitics podcast, Distinguished
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  Research Fellow
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  Michael Auslin
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  said that “Chinese leader Xi Jinping invoking the ‘Thucydides Trap’ during
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  meetings with President Trump is ‘not good history’” and amounts to a “sign of
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  weakness.” Auslin argues that Xi uses this phrase “because it's a tool to
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  freeze the Americans in place by raising the fear that we're going to stumble into
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  war.” Auslin further explains that Chinese diplomats have deployed this
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  concept “for a very long time over economics." As he notes, the idea of the
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  Thucydides Trap is invoked by Chinese officials to try to scare their American
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  counterparts away from calling out abuses of Uyghurs, coercive trade practices, or
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  aggression against states like Taiwan or Japan. The historian adds that the
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  success of US operations against Iran have heightened Chinese military
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  insecurities,
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  as Xi and his generals understand that they lack similar power projection
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  capabilities.
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  Featured Research Initiative: Emerging Markets & Developing Economies.
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  Using a practical, fact-driven approach, the Emerging Markets & Developing
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  Economies research program at the Hoover Institution jointly convenes high-level
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  public- and private-sector decision makers and researchers to address some of
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  the biggest challenges to inclusive and sustained high growth in developing
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  economies, diagnosing problems and discussing feasible solutions.
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  That’s your Hoover Daily Report for Friday, May 15th, twenty twenty six.
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  Each weekday, we bring you research, analysis, and commentary focused on
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  public policy, national security, and the ideas shaping American society and
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  government.
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  The Hoover Institution at Stanford University is grounded in constitutional
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  principles with a commitment to sustaining the safeguards of the American
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  way of life.
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  Thank you for listening.
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  For links to all the articles and interviews mentioned today, visit
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  hoover.org slash, HDR.