Restrictive practices drive up the price of much else, from medicines to air fares.
LA's twin ports have been hit especially hard, thanks to a mixture of restrictive practices imposed by the unions and poor planning by the management.
This, they say, is why they are more like public utilities than private markets, and why they were, until recently, permitted to maintain so many restrictive practices.
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And the Maritime Union, which has controlled jobs on the docks for nearly a century, knows as much about featherbedding and restrictive practices as about handling cargo.
But on the minus side, Mr Monti wants to farm out most of the enforcement of rules against restrictive practices, such as price-fixing, to national watchdogs and courts.
Meanwhile, now that most, if not all, restrictive practices at exchanges are on the way out, market forces can surely be relied on to drive trading costs down.
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Meatpacking companies have responded to international competition by shifting their operations from old industrial cities, with their heavily unionised workforces and restrictive practices, to rural areas and small towns.
In general, the goodies have come less in the form of pay rises (too visible), than in over-generous pensions and health care, early retirement and the sort of restrictive practices that were chased out of the private sector years ago.
What is needed is deregulation of labor markets and removal of restrictive employment practices.
Restrictive labor practices mean that employers avoid growth and hiring, even when it is a no-brainer.
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Its trade commissioner, Sir Leon Brittan, would like all the organisation's members to commit themselves to introducing effective competition laws, covering mergers, monopolies and restrictive business practices.
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