Migration 'addiction' affects Americans' productivity - WSJ.

Companies and national governments are suffering from a "dependence" on migration, hurting productivity that could boost personal incomes and overall national wealth, say economists cited in a report published Monday in the Wall Street Journal.

"Increased reliance on low-skilled immigration can lead to slower productivity growth, which ultimately determines the rate at which economies expand," the March 4 article wrote.

This article provides examples of two sharecropper dairy farmers in Wisconsin. One farmer supports the use of cheap labor supplied through the government's informal illegal migration program. The second farmer, however, has invested in robotic cow milking devices: Onan Whitcomb spent $800,000 on four Dutch-made cow milking machines. Milk production per cow increased by 30% and mastitis, an inflammatory disease, decreased by 80%, which means less antibiotic costs. Whitcomb says he was able to cut 2.5 jobs and the investment paid for itself in seven years. "We were milking 300 cows and now we're milking 240 and still getting more milk," Whitcomb said.