It's funny that restaurant burger prices in my EU country are basically the same as in your "upscale American city". I thought everything there was more expensive since the higher percentiles of your salaries are so much higher.
North America has a unified agriculture market amongst Mexico, US, and Canada - drastically simplifying logistics.
The EU has a similar setup, but 26 countries still adds some overhead versus 3 countries with some form of a "Commerce Clause". It makes sense though - a Polish farmer probably can't compete with a Dutch farmer at scale due to less capital to invest in relatively expensive automation or larger operations.
At least you aren't paying East Asian prices for a lot of produce.
