Two weeks ago, the Coalition for Government Procurement was privileged to participate in the Section 809 Panel’s September stakeholder meeting, an opportunity, for which, the Coalition is grateful, as it provided for a wide-ranging conversation on current challenges and opportunities facing the federal procurement system.
The Coalition also appreciates the opportunity to provide our 29 “common sense” recommendations to improve and streamline federal procurement.
Chief among the issues discussed was the role of Multiple Award IDIQ (MAIDIQ) contracts in supporting agency missions. With regard to MAIDIQs, the conversation quickly turned to the degree, manner, and role of competition in the federal market. It was an interesting and dynamic discussion.
The Coalition highlighted a measure of market concentration which is used by both economists and the Justice Department when evaluating anti-trust issues, the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index (HHI). The HHI scale for measuring market concentration ranges from 0 to 10,000, with 0 representing “perfect competition,” and 10,000 representing a pure monopoly. Based on various market concentration criteria, a market is scored along this scale. Basically, the lower a market’s HHI score, the higher that market’s level of competition and vice-versa. When considering the HHI, we find some interesting results.
Keep reading this article at: https://federalnewsradio.com/commentary/2017/10/the-federal-market-is-competition-in-the-eye-of-the-beholder/
