According to a recent survey by ‘The Sunday Telegraph’ consumers in Australia have been shelling more money for apparel as compared to their American counterparts. The paper compared prices of 70 products in the two nations and found that at times, some items were charged twice as much as in the United States. The survey comprised several shopping trips by the paper’s journalists, to several department stores, hypermarkets and specialist outlets in Australia and the US. It was observed by
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| the survey, that while a Levi’s 501 blue denim jeans cost AU$135 in Sydney, in US it was priced only at US$59 in a leading US department store. In addition to apparel, items such as music CDs, Palm Pilots and athletic footwear were available at equally higher prices in Australia. While some industry sources attribute this price difference to the high mark-ups by the retailers, a few others claim that some manufacturers were pricing their goods higher in the Australian markets, thus forcing the retailers to pass on the costs to the consumers. 
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