I know I’ve written before about the sometimes-startling differences in what things cost here in Sweden compared to what they cost in the States. I think the reason that I am still surprised is because some of the differences don’t make any sense whatsoever. I mean, I can understand that a small jar of lingonberry jam will cost five times in the States what a large jar of same will cost in Sweden — lingon is all over the place here, and people eat it like it’s going out of style, whereas in the States it’s something of a novelty item. On the other hand, you can buy a dozen eggs in the States for a third of the price of six eggs here — though this, of course, is not because people eat fewer eggs here, but rather because the chicken-farming standards are much higher than they are in the States and it costs more to produce eggs.<\/p>\n
Today I was faced with two examples that really don’t make sense to me. The first is keys. I went to the locksmith shop to have two keys cut for Lydia, a housekey and a bike key, and the bill at the end was 150:-, or $20. That’s insanity! You can get a key cut at Wal-mart for ninety-nine cents … why on earth should the price be ten times<\/em> as much in Sweden?! The mind boggles. Luckily, I had bought keys in Sweden before, so I didn’t have a heart attack when I heard what I owed.<\/p>\n My second example is veterinary care. This afternoon I had to take our cat, Moa, to the vet for an emergency visit (that’s another post, but I don’t feel like writing it right now). After a thorough check-up, sedation, blood tests, a nose\/throat examination, a bag of IV fluid, an antibiotic shot, AND the emergency-visit fee, I paid 550:-, or $75. That is strikingly less than what I would have expected to pay for similar treatment at any of the vets I went to in Idaho. Not long before I moved to Sweden I took a cat to the vet, with an appointment–so no extra cost for an emergency time–to have an abscess lanced. She had only a cursory check-up with no sedation or other treatment, and it cost me upwards of $40. It would have cost half that at my vet here, who in addition to having very reasonable prices is one of the better vets I’ve ever visited.<\/p>\n So, there you have it: no apparent rhyme or reason to pricing, in some cases. All things considered, however, I’d much rather pay ten times as much for something cheap and half as much for something expensive than the other way around.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I know I’ve written before about the sometimes-startling differences in what things cost here in Sweden compared to what they cost in the States. I think the reason that I am still surprised is because some of the differences don’t make any sense whatsoever. I mean, I can understand that a small jar of lingonberry… Read More Contrasts<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-568","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beverlyrevelry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beverlyrevelry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beverlyrevelry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beverlyrevelry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beverlyrevelry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=568"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beverlyrevelry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beverlyrevelry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=568"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beverlyrevelry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=568"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beverlyrevelry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=568"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}