Among other things, project labor agreements, the technique by which influential construction unions crowd out competition, drive up costs for taxpayers, and pocket lots of money on government construction projects. Read about them in this article.
Naturally, the Obama administration is much in favor of PLAs, since some of the union haul winds up in Democratic campaign coffers. This is a good example of special interest politics at work — concentrated benefits for a few, widely diffused costs for everyone else.
