I spotted these food prices in some US grocery store catalogues. They are all much cheaper than prices in Australia for similar items.
As a comparison, $2 per pound of chicken breasts would be equivalent to about $5 per kilogram, which would be about $6 Australian (AUD). The cheapest I can buy chicken breasts for its about $8 AUD, and is often $12 AUD per kg; same for pork. Avocados where I live are cheap if they are $1.70 AUD each, and are often $3.40 each. And I don’t think I’ve ever been able to get peppers (capsicum) for that sort of price.
But this one is the biggie! I pay $160 AUD per month just for cable TV (and not 200 HD channels either, and not even cable – instead satellite that drops out in bad weather), another $130/month for internet and phone and definitely not 60 Mbps (the maximum where I live is 24 Mbps, but the reality is more like 15), and another $70/month for mobile phone. That’s some $360/month for what this US company is advertising at $30 / month. No, I know nothing about this company, its services, or its reliability, but I wonder why we pay 10x what the US pays for similar services? Those Australian prices seem like a rip-off to me!
Rhonda Bracey: At Random 
That is a “grabber” price to get you “hooked” with that company but it still only goes to around $60 to $80 after that time ends. It’s called huge competition!!! There are so many companies offering these services that I’m surprised it’s not less $$$. Food prices are on a major rise due to So. California’s severe drought and beef is just going up due to the drought a year or so ago. By the first of the year is forecast to be significantly higher but not what you deal with.
Wow, you do pay more than then United States, but I have some questions comments:
a) Charter Spectrum – I actually use this company and my bill is definitely not that cheap (and in the tiny print it probably says it is only good for 6 months). We pay about $140 for cable and internet. The phone they are listing is the house phone (using internet) – not mobile (cell phone). We have a family plan for our cell phone so it is about $50 per line (it was more per phone when we only had the one cell phone).
b) The sale prices you saw for food are definitely not the regular prices.
c) Do you grow chickens, beef or pork in Australia? I don’t know the answer to that. But, if you don’t I would think the shipping cost would be huge.
d) I have a friend who moved to Australia and posted the cost for a pumpkin last year. The price was definitely insane, but I remember the sign said it was imported from the United States so it would have the high shipping cost.
I know when we visit Hawaii the cost of food is a lot higher than even on the US Mainland. So, I know shipping costs definitely add to the price.
Yes, I understand the ‘grabber’ price, but our grabbers are more like $50 just for internet.
And yes we grow our own chickens, beef, pork, etc in Australia – in fact we export a lot of beef and lamb to the US. So freight /import costs are not a factor. We grow our own (eating) pumpkins too, but I would guess we import carving pumpkins for Oct as I don’t think we grow that variety.
The lower end of the prices I quoted for Australia were the lowest sale prices I’ve seen in the past 12 months or so. And yes, sale prices are always less than regular prices, but these seemed exceptionally low compared to what I’m used to.