State Governments used to have purchasing preferences to advantage local suppliers.
Such measures added needless costs and were always of dubious validity.
It took the competition reforms over the past decade to finally abolish them.
But not all competition between states is bad.
Competitive federalism in the European Union has been an important growth propellant.
Nations that have reduced taxes and regulations have bucked the EU's rather ordinary overall economic performance.
Low taxes and deregulation have been the Fairy Godmother transforming Ireland -- Europe's Cinderella -- from rags to riches.
Irish income levels are now considerably above England's.
Some newer EU members are following similar paths.
These include Slovakia where Porsche has located its new assembly plant and which is experiencing incomes growing at 8 per cent a year.
Other federal systems have seen comparable outcomes.
In California, regulatory excesses are undermining the state's advantages as a high-tech centre.
California is now seeing jobs migrating to neighbouring states where more liberal regulations have resulted in cheaper house prices.
Similar outcomes are possible in Australia.
In New South Wales planning restrictions have brought the average house cost to $480,000.
This is even more excessive than the $330,000 average in Melbourne and Brisbane.
Land development restrictions in South Australia have inflated Adelaide's house prices to levels above those of Melbourne.
The SA Minister has responded by requiring that 15 per cent of all new housing developments must be "affordable".
This will disadvantage other new home buyers and mean even higher average prices.
Over recent decades, planning restraints on land availability together with higher taxes have resulted in Australia's house prices doubling relative to wages.
House prices have risen from about three times the average level of family incomes to over six times family income levels.
A block of land fully serviced for housing on the fringe of all Australian cities should be no more than $60,000.
It is two to five times that much as a result of "planning" policies creating a shortage of land for housing.
In a delicious irony, Victoria's most senior politician-lawyer, Rob Hulls, has been caught in the intensification of the state regulatory web which he himself has weaved.
In buying a house in an area newly restrained from development, his wife, also a lawyer, now finds she cannot build on it.
Welcome to the Brave New World where land ownership rights are trumped by government controls!
The impending federal election has ignited policy discussion on housing.
Some Liberals are calling for a doubling of the First Home Owners grant.
Federal Labor is calling for increased regulatory oversight of existing funding.
Both proposals overlook the bonus available from deregulating land supply.
John Brumby has been trumpeting Victoria's lower housing costs.
His Queensland counterpart is to issue a major policy proposal on the matter in a few weeks time.
Land supply regulations in Australia's federal system open up opportunities for beneficial competition between the states.
It would be a wonderful bonus for those aspiring to home ownership to see state competition reducing restrictions on land use and bringing more affordable house prices.
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