After looking up the prices of Microsoft Points in the different regions (Wikipedia page here) I saw another example of the amount of money Microsoft makes by ripping off people outside of the United States. If you look at the page you can see that the second and especially the 5 region is being ripped off big time. Now there are some explanations given for the higher price because of the fact that in the USA the taxes aren't being raised on the purchase of the points itself in the store, but the taxes are beingreductedwhen making a purchase with these points in the online store, so the points aren't expensive, but the purchases in the online store are.

But after looking up the prices, I found that Microsoft also found a way to come around these taxes. They make the purchases for people in the USA cheaper, so that even when the taxes are raised in the onlinestore, the products are just as expensive as in the other regions. So this again makes the purchases cheaper than in the other regions, because there is the same amount of Microsoft points beingspendon the products, beyond the fact that the Microsoft points are cheaper in the other regions.

So, a quick summary,

In region 2 are the taxes for online purchases being raised on the purchase of the Microsoft points in the 'real life'store. And in the USA the taxes are being raised on the purchase in the online store. But Microsoft makes the product in the USA version of the online store cheaper so that the purchase cost the same amount of Microsoft Points as in the other regions online stores, except for the fact that the other regions already paid taxes over the purchase, and are paying the same price for it.

So we pay for the taxes in our region, and the same price for it that USAusers pay that includes the taxes raised on the online store purchases.

So without living in the USA we pay for their taxes to, just so Microsoft can make more money because we need to buy Microsoft points more frequently.

. I shoud have bought a PS3.