Quote:
Originally Posted by AnotherCat
While books can be parallel imported into NZ, both commercially and privately, as far as I can see it has not had much effect on the pricing of books in physical shops but has made a big difference for online purchases through local and overseas web sellers. Physical shops complain that the cost of books to them from the publishers can be higher than the retail price being offered by parallel importers (parallel imports have to be, of course, legitimate copies) so it would seem that it may be the publishers who are being inflexible.
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Interesting. Are they still going through local publishers or are they able to source from foreign publishers? Though if the books are published under one publisher using different local imprints I can see where this might make no difference.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fbone
Has there ever been a government study to determine why Australian media companies charge "premium" prices?
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It's not just media, it's everything. Known locally as the "Australia Tax".
IT products
Books
It is worth noting that the government of the day pretty much ignored the recommendations of the book import review, so it remains to be seen whether this report just disappears into a black hole. In its favour is that the major companies involved are not Australian so they don't have the political leverage that the publishers had.
Quote:
Originally Posted by fjtorres
There are plenty of places in the US that are physically isolated and face higher prices. Because it is actually more expensive to get the products there. (Been there, lived with it. UPS isn't always cheap.) And that is assuming you *can* get them. There are places were Amazon prime only offers free shipping instead of free 2 day shipping. And it is much appreciated anyway.
Likewise there are cultures and subcultures that face higher prices because their products are niche or outside the mainstream.
High prices are not always gauging.
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Sure, but those are not the products we are complaining about. Now explain the price differentials for the same electronic product delivered digitally, ie ebooks, digital music, software, etc.