Yes it's true that they just change the US$ to the €, but they did that from the beginning. As I said in 2001 there was no big difference in the prices, aseuropean prices include sales tax they could have been even lower. But with the decreasing of the Dollar value it became chaeper and chaeper...
It's not taxes that increases the price, the main reason is the $/€ exchange rate. In 2001, when the Euro was launched the exchange rate wasalmost 1:1, today it's 1:1,43. So the US prices actually are low for europeans not the other way around ... I remember spending my holidays in Californiain...