Public is a large share of government spending and receives attention proportional to its scandals rather than its size.
Competitive is the standard remedy and produces competition only when several firms actually bid.
In many markets the number of is one or two, and the tender is a ceremony.
Thin participation has causes that are administrative rather than criminal.
requirements that take a week to complete exclude a firm of ten people.
Payment terms of ninety days exclude a firm without .
Contracts bundled into a single large lot exclude everybody except the .
Each rule was introduced to prevent a specific failure, and together they select for size rather than competence.
Splitting a contract into is the cheapest reform available and is resisted by staff.
Managing five suppliers is five times the work of managing one, and the department is not paid more for doing it.
The saving appears in the budget and the cost appears in a workload nobody counts.
Transparency portals that publish every award have produced measurable effects where the data are usable.
Publishing a scanned document satisfies a law and informs nobody.
Publishing structured records allows a journalist to notice that one supplier wins every contract in one region.
Several such patterns were found by volunteers within weeks of a portal opening.
The reform with the best evidence behind it is the least discussed.
Paying suppliers on time increases the number of and lowers the winning price.
It costs a government nothing except the discipline of paying its own .