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Think for a moment about your car.
就拿你的車來說。
It has thousands of parts, from the foam that makes the seats to the electrical wiring to the light bulbs.
它由數千個零件組成，從座椅的海綿，到電線，到燈泡。
And for many of those parts, the world's carmakers, they are dependent on only a few suppliers.
對于許多這些零件，世上的汽車制造商只依賴少數供應商。
So it's hardly surprising that it is kind of tempting for those suppliers to come together and fix prices.
所以，那些供應商會被誘惑到聚在一起定價格，這一點也不奇怪。
But just imagine what that could do to the final price of your new car in the market.
但是想像一下，這么做對新車在市場上的最終價格有何影響。
Except, it's not imaginary.
然而這些并非虛構。
The European Commission has dealt with already seven different car parts cartels, and we're still investigating some.
歐盟委員會已處理了七件不同車零件的壟斷案例，還有一些案例我們仍在調查。
Here, the Department of Justice are also looking into the market for car parts,
在這里，司法部也在調查車零件的市場，
and it has called it the biggest criminal investigation it has ever pursued.
并稱其為有史以來最大宗的刑事調查。
But without competition rules, there would be no investigation,
但是如果沒有競爭規范，就不會有任何調查，
and there would be nothing to stop this collusion from happening and the prices of your car to go up.
也沒辦法阻止這種勾當，然后你轎車的價格就會飆升。
Yet it's not only companies who can undermine fair competition. Governments can do it, too.
破壞公平競爭的除了公司企業，還有政府機構。
And governments do that when they hand out subsidies to just the favorite few, the selected.
政府發補貼給受青睞的少數時就已經在破壞公平競爭了。
They may do that when they hand out subsidies -- and, of course, all financed by taxpayers -- to companies.
政府發補貼給企業的時候也可能破壞公平競爭，當然，所有費用由納稅人買單。
That may be in the form of special tax treatments,
這種破壞可能以特別稅收待遇的形式出現，
like the tax benefits that firms like Fiat, Starbucks and Apple got from some governments in Europe.
比如，賦稅優惠，像菲亞特、星巴克和蘋果這類大公司在歐洲得到一些政府的稅收優惠。
Those subsidies stop companies from competing on equal terms.
這些補貼破壞了公司間的公平競爭。
They can mean that the companies that succeed, well, they are the companies that got the most subsidy,
這意味著成功的公司是那些得到最多補貼的公司，
the ones that are the best-connected, and not, as it should be, the companies that serve consumers the best.
也是最會搞關系的公司，然而成功的公司應該是給消費者最好的服務的。
So there are times when we need to step in to make sure that competition works the way it should.
所以，我們得時不時介入，確保競爭依其原本的方式進行。
By doing that, we help the market to work fairly, because competition gives consumers the power to demand a fair deal.
這么做，我們幫助市場公平運作，因為競爭使消費者有權做公平的交易。
It means that companies know that if they cannot offer good prices or the service that's expected, well, the customers will go somewhere else.
這表示，如果公司企業知道自己不能提供更好的價格或提供預期的服務，那么消費者就會另尋他處。
