There's a number of factors, but I'd say the most important ones are: 1. taxes, although it varies. Imported consumer electronics are taxed more heavily. Howev

There's a number of factors, but I'd say the most important ones are: 1. taxes, although it varies. Imported consumer electronics are taxed more heavily. However, there are regions with fiscal incentives for companies to install their factories here. Products manufactured in such regions are not as nearly expensive; 2. an excess of credit offered by banks. This created an extremely pernicious cultural habit: people don't evaluate the product's price, but the loan's installment size -- regardless of how expensive is the product, the interest paid to the bank, the number of installments etc. 3. there's a fetish for fancy and expensive stuff, they bring social status, and people are idiot enough to accept the prices -- and, with the aforementioned excess of credit, no lack of money can prevent them from shooting their own heads. These are essentially the same reasons why cars are also so expensive here. Manufacturers say it's because taxes, and ~ 100% of customers buy this bullshit, but this has already been proved wrong a number of times. For any brazilians doubting it, I invite you guys to: 1. look up any article comparing prices of Brazilian-manufactured cars sold locally vs their prices when exported to Mexico. The difference on taxes don't explain the end prices, and the manufacturers and ANFAVEA never provided an explanation for that 2. a statement from Toyota's CEO when visiting Brazil, probably unaware of local idiosyncrasies and the fib told by manufacturers, including themselves: "why should we charge less for our cars if they are paying?"; and then he tried to fix it with a "the prices we charge in Brazil are the fair ones, it's the rest of the world that forces us to charge too little." 3. Nintendo closing its factory due to "an excess of taxes and bureaucracy" while Sony and Microsoft local factories were doing pretty well in the very same market 4. The small credit crisis from 2011 that made car prices to drop extremely sharply within 1 month or so