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Denmark is most expensive EU country for consumer goods

The Local Denmark
The Local Denmark - [email protected]
Denmark is most expensive EU country for consumer goods
File photo: Asger Ladefoged/Ritzau Scanpix

Consumer goods and services in Denmark cost 142 percent of the EU average, according to figures published by the European Union’s statistics agency Eurostat.

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According to data collected by the agency, price levels for consumer goods and services differed widely across EU member countries in 2017, but Denmark, at 142 percent of the EU average, had the highest price levels.

Denmark was followed by Luxembourg (127 percent), Ireland and Sweden (both 125 percent), Finland (122 percent) and the United Kingdom (117 percent).

At the opposite end of the scale, the lowest price level was found in Bulgaria (48 percent), while Romania (52 percent) and Poland (56 percent) were just above 50 percent of the average.

That means that price levels for consumer goods and services in the EU varied by almost one to three between the cheapest and the most expensive member state.

It is also interesting to note that three non-EU countries that are part of the European Free Trade Association -- Switzerland, Norway and Iceland -- all have higher prices than Denmark.

Denmark came top in four out of six sub-categories. The price level of a comparable basket of food and non-alcoholic beverages was 150 percent of the average in Denmark, the most expensive country, compared with 62 percent in Romania, the cheapest.

Restaurants and hotels are three times more expensive Denmark (151 percent of the average) than in Bulgaria, the cheapest country for the measure at 45 percent of the average cost for the EU.

For consumer goods, all though there was less variation overall in prices in individual countries compared to the EU average, Denmark still found itself as the number one for the category at 110 percent, level with France. The cheapest country for this form of goods is Ireland (86 percent).

Cars, motor cycles and bicycles cost far more in Denmark than anywhere else in the bloc. Denmark’s prices are 144 percent of the EU average. With only one other exception (Netherlands, 121 percent) prices in all other countries lie within 81 to 111 percent of the average.

The two categories in which Denmark did not have the most expensive purchasing prices include alcohol and tobacco, where the highest prices were observed in Ireland (174 percent) and the United Kingdom (157 percent), followed at a distance by three Nordic countries: Finland (139 percent), Sweden (127 percent) and Denmark (123 percent).

This large price variation is mainly due to differences in taxation of these products among Member States, Eurostat notes.

For clothing, Sweden, the home of H&M, was the most expensive country with prices at 134 percent of the average. Denmark was second-most expensive.

The data used by the agency was taken from the results of a price survey covering more than 2,400 consumer goods and services across Europe.

More details on the Eurostat analysis can be found on the agency’s website here.

READ ALSO: Copenhagen is world's ninth most expensive city: report

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