You can buy nexus 4 in us for about $300-350 and in about 450-550 Eur. That can't be all tax. It's fishy

(depending on memory size)

...low or no import duties (especially from Asia)?

Consumer electronics may get quite cheap in the US during sales (a friend bought an Ultrabook for half-price during Thanksgiving!), but from what I've seen (from my relatives in the US), stuff's generally cheaper in East Asia, except for computer components.

When the PS3 came out, it (famously) cost 599 USD. In Europe it cost 599 EUR, which was around 800 USD at the time.

Everyone just thought of it as a rip-off, but to be honest, the USofA average income truly is lower than that of the EU...

It is cheaper than most European Countries, but East Asia is cheapest due to tax rates of ~5-10%. It is also because alot of tech is assembled there so its cheaper to ship it.

US tax rates vary by state, but look to be about 8-16%.

Most European countries are between 20 and 25%, bar a few smaller ones.

Then ofcourse we have the currency fluctuations and the good old US still trying to pretend the Dollar is what it used to be...

Competition is a big factor too. Competition breeds pressure on gov to reduce taxes and tariffs. And businesses rule gov in US, not the other way around. Plus, to sell to large number of,people and move volume, you need it to be relatively cheap.

The stuff about East Asia being cheapest doesn't seem true for Thailand/Bangkok. I've never seen stuff being more expensive than in Germany before (@Siam Paragon). (ok maybe France and UK, but that's EU..)

Bangkok has the cheapest Nikon lenses you can find along with Singapore... Siam Paragon is one of the largest shopping centres so of course its going to be expensive; tourists end up there so they jack up the prices + rentals are very high in there... Oh also Siam Paragon is deliberately a luxury goods mall so how can you get good prices there

well add on tax and it would be £258, then add on delivery it would be £268, not far of Google's price of £279

It's a result of a basic economic principle called price discrimination. Companies will extract as much consumer surplus as possible. In other words, get the consumer to pay the absolute maximum they're willing to pay. Tech is expensive here in Australia - if you look at our minimum wage here it's much higher than what you get in the states