finicky said:
That lime example was so selective as to be ridiculous. Food's cheap: cold pressed olive oil, dried or canned legumes, rice, tinned tomatoes, tinned tuna, seasonal fruit and vegetables, tea or coffe, a few condiments, cut priced beer or wine. Home and hosed on a budget. I worked on vegetable and fruit farms and saw the costs: weather, insects, fungal disasters, massive packing shed rejects, and youse all get it fresh and beautiful without the sweat for almost nothing in season.
Learn to preserve food or only eat what is in season, saves a fortune! We have limes all year round, frozen juice, frozen zest, salted limes, lime marmalade, limocello.
But back to the cheap stuff, my visitors from the UK can buy Australian wine cheaper in the UK than I can buy it in my local budget off-licence.
It is still not expensive to buy a bottle of wine in Australia but even with UK tax being about 20%, twice what the Australian GST is and the additional transportation costs to ship it over to the other side of the world, it is still cheaper in the UK.
When we came to Australia about 5 years ago we could eat out at the RSL, all you could eat buffett including steaks with unlimited soft serve ice cream, for $9.99. That is no longer an option and the cheapest option is about $15 for a burger meal.
Still not expensive but relative to what it used to be only a few years ago it is expensive. People notice that.
I guess the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence, we see other people paying less for the same services and goods and feel cheated, its not as if the government or shops are providing the sunshine and lifestyle that they are charging extra for.
. I have a friend who lived there for 2 years. She said there was no way possible for her to work and go to school at the same time there because of how expensive it was, so she had to move back to america.
