known to the retailer, leading to a situation where the final cost of an item can greatly exceed expectations. Dedicated cross-border shopping solutions such as Canada Post's Borderfree program existed to mitigate these problems with varied success. In the end, caution is necessary to determine the final cost of goods before purchase. The consumer import of prescription drugs from Canada and Mexico into the United States can provide a large cost savings for the patient, and is sometimes even facilitated by insurance companies, and the quality of medicine in Canada is comparable to that in the United States During the COVID-19 pandemic that began in 2020, the US–Canada and US–Mexico borders were closed to non-essential traffic, leaving merchants who normally catered to cross-border shoppers stranded with no access to their customers. Exclaves such as Point Roberts, Washington, were particularly hard hit. Specific business categories, such as parcel shops, tourism, fuel and dairy incurred severe losses in many border communities; both US–Canada and US–Mexico trade incurred multi-billion dollar impacts. Between U.S. states and across city and county boundaries within states Although not crossing a national boundary, residents of one state may often travel across a state line in order to shop for a variety of goods. In some cases, a larger city or metro area in one state may draw a population in from another state or people may travel outside of city limits to surrounding areas with lower taxes. In other cases, residents may cross boundaries to take advantage of more friendly legislation regarding restricted products, such as alcohol, tobacco, fireworks, firearms, gambling, etc. For example, a New York City resident may engage in illicit cigarette trade by purchasing products in a nearby state with lower taxes and re-selling them illegally in New York. Furthermore, states which have legalized recreational marijuana may experience a high-amount of out-of-state customers. Asia Many Singaporeans also travel to Johor Bahru in Malaysia or Batam in Indonesia, to take advantage of price differences and differing product availability. The Singaporean government has a law that requires a car leaving Singapore to have the fuel tank filled by at least 75 percent, to prevent it from being filled with fuel from outside Singapore. Shenzhen, on the border of mainland China with the special administrative region of Hong Kong, also benefits from border trade. See also Tax avoidance and tax evasion Border checkpoint Border control Arbitrage References External