featherbedding

See also: feather-bedding

English

Verb

featherbedding

1. present participle and gerund of featherbed

Noun

featherbedding (uncountable)

1. (US) The employment of more workers than is necessary, typically because of labor union rules (or sometimes deals with organized crime, a government, etc), especially upon the introduction of new technology.
   • 2019, Seth Harp, “Blood and Oil”, in Rolling Stone:

     It [Pemex, Mexico's state-owned petroleum company] eventually grew bigger than Gazprom, the Russian state oil company, but it has always had a problem with internal malfeasance and featherbedding. “Corporate governance is poor,” says Duncan Wood, head of the Mexico Institute at the Wilson Center. “It’s disorganized. There are little fiefdoms within it. They strike deals with organized crime and turn a blind eye.”

   • 2020 September 11, James Walston, The Mafia and Clientelism: Roads to Rome in Post-War Calabria, Routledge, →ISBN:

     Two factors made the Ministry untenable; private industry considered the featherbedding of the public sector to be unfair competition. Since the DC depends on private industry for much of its support, continuing the practice would have compromised this support.