Entries were delayed while routine data was verified at the port of entry. In an effort to keep up with these demands , Customs automated its processes to increase efficiencies. However, the automation was still based on individual transactions while industry was automating its purchasing and inventory controls by account, time period and production needs. The competing systems were not compatible. In the economic realm, competition is the means whereby the self-interest of buyers and sellers acts to serve the needs of society as well as those of individual market participants.
Society is served well when the maximum number of goods is produced at the lowest possible prices.
In the political realm, competition between government and private industry has the opposite effect. Society is not served well. Customs and industry officials were competing with one another. Cooperation on the other hand, brings about a more efficient use of resources and a higher level of compliance. Cooperatives are known as a system of economic action and business enterprise, characterized by the absence of the profit motive and involving, as its primary function, the distribution of goods and services.