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# Assize of Bread

## Definition

A legal regulation that fixes the price of bread based on the price of wheat, which Smith identifies as one of the few remaining examples of medieval attempts to regulate merchant profits by controlling commodity prices.

## Source Chapter

Book I, Chapter 10

## Context

Smith discusses the assize of bread as a remnant of older regulatory practices that attempted to control profits by fixing prices. He argues that where competition exists, it regulates prices more effectively than any legal assize, and that such regulations are generally unnecessary and potentially harmful.

## Economic Domain

Regulation

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