What is the illegal practice of eliminating competition through price agreements called?

The practice of eliminating competition through price agreements is known as price fixing. This illegal activity occurs when businesses or competitors come to an agreement to set prices at a certain level, rather than allowing market forces to determine prices. This manipulation of prices restricts fair competition and can lead to higher costs for consumers, as the natural competitive process of supply and demand is undermined.

In a market economy, competition typically benefits consumers by driving prices down and improving quality. However, in cases of price fixing, companies collude to keep prices artificially high, which not only harms consumers but also disrupts the fairness of market interactions.

Other terms like price discrimination pertain to charging different prices for the same good to different consumers, price gouging refers to raising prices to unfair levels during emergencies, and price indexing involves tracking and adjusting prices based on inflation or other economic indicators—all of which have distinct legal and economic implications that do not involve collocation to eliminate competition in the same way as price fixing.