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some of the Tomei info in this thread is correct, some of it is not.
just look at it this way: corporations have shareholders, some companies protected themselves by assigning 100% ownership to another legal entity/individual in Japan, while others rely on a trusted individual to set up a company here (but did not retain any shares back in Japan or other overseas country/territory)
At the end of the day, buying from Japan does not mean it is made in Japan to begin with, it just means you make the overseas transaction from JPY to USD. If you have parts built in China or Taiwan, it may be the exact same item from the exact same factory but those countries prefer to sell/export in USD, so there's no fluctuation of exchange rates and your pricing is more stable.
Things like recession make buying in USD better, as your cost/price structure is intact and less fluid. HKS left the US market in 2008 primarily because the yen made their cost skyrocket by 50%... now they're back but they got smarter. They don't have any US warehouse/distribution structure (instead shipping directly to Turn 14 or Motovicity), and they decided to make their exhausts outside of Japan (in Thailand).
Greddy does the exact same thing, except most of it is produced in Taiwan and shipped to the US directly. Their most expensive exhausts (~$2000 MSRP) are still made in Japan.
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