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Hoover Daily Report | February 18, 2026 · Hoover Daily Report

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  Welcome to the Hoover Daily Report. Ideas Advancing Freedom. It's Wednesday,
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  February 18th, 2026.
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  Today, John Cochrane reassures us that AI's introduction into workplaces.
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  Just like so many other past technological developments will lead to more jobs,
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  not fewer. Next, Stephen J.
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  Davis and co-authors ask thousands of corporate directors in four countries
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  about that same issue.
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  David Newmark explains why higher minimum wages do not improve income
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  inequality.
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  And Schuit ganglia tells us why a new trade agreement between India and the US
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  will do little to restore trust lost in Delhi this past year.
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  Will AI take your job? Artificial intelligence has revived an old question.
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  Our machines coming for our jobs. In this week's Grumpy Economist weekly rant,
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  John Cochrane places AI in historical perspective arguing that today's anxieties
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  echo past reactions to transformative innovations.
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  From the printing press to tractors to the internet,
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  each wave of technological change eliminated specific tasks,
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  yet expanded productivity incomes and new forms of employment.
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  Cochrane explains that AI is more likely to replace tasks than entire jobs,
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  freeing workers from routine activities and enabling higher value output.
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  Like previous general purpose technologies,
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  AI will follow an S-shaped diffusion curve requiring time for firms to adapt and
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  reorganize rather than signaling economic decline.
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  AI represents a new productivity enhancing breakthrough,
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  particularly in sectors such as health.
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  At a moment when growth has slowed and the working age population is shrinking.
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  Firm data on ai. In a new working paper,
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  senior fellows j Davis and 12 co-authors surveyed nearly
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  6,000 senior executives from firms in four countries about their views on how AI
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  will improve productivity.
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  They find that while many firms and their leaders are regularly using ai,
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  there has not yet been a marked increase in productivity as a result. However,
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  these corporate leaders say they expect future output and productivity to
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  increase as a result of generative AI use.
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  Firms predict sizable impacts over the next three years.
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  Forecasting AI will boost productivity by 1.4%,
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  increase output by 0.8% and cut employment by 0.7%
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  Davis and his co-authors, right. Meanwhile,
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  a survey of frontline workers at those same firms found they expect AI to
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  increase employment going forward.
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  The minimum wage is a dead end clamor for higher minimum wages is on the rise
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  among both major US political parties as a strategy to win over voters worried
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  about affordability. Unfortunately,
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  the minimum wage is a poor tool to influence inequality and even worse at
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  reducing poverty. Wrights visiting fellow David Newmark,
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  the problem is that minimum wages in many states are implicated in job losses
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  and reduced hours outweighing any individual benefits. The economist says,
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  moreover,
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  small business owners are disproportionately harmed by having to pay higher
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  wages and raise their prices.
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  While such laws have no impact at all on higher earners, as for poverty,
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  despite decades of political praise,
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  the minimum wage seems to have nearly zero impact Newmark rights.
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  What would a better tool look like?
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  Perhaps like the earned income tax credit he suggests,
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  which increases poor workers' income while expanding the incentive to work and
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  thus boosting long-term earnings.
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  A US India trade deal can't restore lost trust after a year of friction.
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  In the budding US India relationship argues senior fellow schuit ganguli and
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  foreign policy,
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  a tentative trade agreement will stop the friendship from hemorrhaging further,
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  but do little ELs following scuffles between Indian Prime Minister Modi and
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  President Trump on imports of Russian oil,
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  which leader did more to end the short Pakistan India Air War in May,
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  2025 and the US imposition of blanket 26% tariffs on Indian
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  exports the month before. There is little enthusiasm in deepening ties.
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  Gangoli writes that the Indians will likely ratify a draft trade deal with the
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  us, but doubts and concerns will linger.
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  The trade deal may at best limit the US India relationship from plummeting to
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  unknown depths. However,
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  Indian mistrust and misgivings about US foreign policy choices have returned to
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  the fore.
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  Cultivating agency character and citizenship.
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  A visit to Vertex partnership academies on the latest episode of today's
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  Battlegrounds, Ian Rowe,
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  co-founder of Vertex Partnership Academies and senior fellow at the American
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  Enterprise Institute and Hoover Senior fellow HR McMaster,
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  discuss education reform and the importance of cultivating agency character
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  and civic understanding in young people.
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  Recorded at Vertex partnership academies in the Bronx,
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  their conversation explores how education can help students develop
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  responsibility, meaning, and moral discernment.
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  Governors who refuse education dollars in the Wall Street Journal,
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  distinguished visiting fellow Daniel Lapinski writes about the governors who
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  have refused to opt into a new federal tax credit for donations to nonprofits
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  that provide scholarships toward K through 12 education costs.
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  The tax credit offers up to $1,700 per person who donates to an education
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  nonprofit and is restricted to programming that supports students and households
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  earning less than 300% of the areas median income.
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  So why would any state leader ever say no to such a thing?
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  As governors in Wisconsin, New Mexico and Oregon already have, Lapinsky says,
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  teachers unions are the culprit.
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  It seems they so abhor the idea that a scholarship might help parents choose
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  which school their child goes to,
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  that they are willing to reject support for students in their own members'
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  classrooms. He writes.
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  Featured Hoover publication, biosecurity really a strategy for victory,
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  drawing on decades of experience in the knowledge of dozens of subject matter
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  experts.
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  Biosecurity really from Hoover's Bio Strategies and Leadership Initiative offers
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  a forward looking analysis of how global trends and technologies are reshaping
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  the biosecurity landscape and actionable steps we can take to respond.
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  That's your Hoover Daily report for Wednesday, February 18th, 26.
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  Each weekday we bring you research, analysis,
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  and commentary focused on public policy, national security,
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  and the ideas shaping American society and 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 way of
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  life. Thank you for listening.
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  For links to all the articles and interviews mentioned today,
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  visit hoover.org/hdr.