lol. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. When I hear what people pay for things not in Vietnam or Thailand ( the only two countries I really have experience in) I am alarmed and no wonder when they do come and visit over here they are very jealous.
There is the couple that I know from Norway and they spend 6 months a year in Vietnam. They tell me that the 6 months of being here and basically doing whatever they want without much concern to costs, is about the same cost as living a single month in Norway. They tell me that they cannot afford to go out to eat and definitely cannot afford to go out drinking.
The "economies of scale" are nuts and I really think that most of it is profiteering on the part of companies. how else can you explain that the exact same product, like colgate for example, costs 10 times as much in the west as it does here even though it is produced inside of that country?