I think people who over buy are a bit selfish as not everybody is in the position to do that and have to go without while others stockpile. It would do us all good to live more simply and manage with less.
Yes, but if we want to be fair those are also the people that were unprepared and started impulse buying. Preppers were already prepared. But I'm not in a situation where I can afford a large pantry and my "storage" is under the beds.
Plus, I'm convinced they (whoever that may be) did that to us intentionally. Why toilet paper? It's the most inconvenient thing to get irritate people and get them talking. Johnny Carson accidentally had the toilet paper sold out in 1973 with a joke people took seriously. People having parties would invite their guests and ask them to bring a roll.
Same thing with the food supply. There were miles of lines at the food banks last year and then the farmers were ordered to destroy their harvests and dump the milk supply. Then here, I remember the state stockpiling. I'm sure if anyone was stockpiling it was the people in charge.
Who profited? Amazon by billions. Then Walmart and Google. Some others I can't think of off the top of my head.
Fortunately not long before I urge to get things that would last to help "save the environment" and got a bidet. Interesting how God puts things on your heart and leads you in the right direction without you really knowing what you're doing. I almost got masks in Dec 19 too, because I was thinking about how much I didn't want to pass on the flu after I got the idea from 90 Day Fiance. (A clip on YouTube.) Then I was told "You don't need that. It's a waste."
It would not have been.
Anyway, I didn't end up stockpiling. I needed to gain weight so I got some things that would probably be helpful anyway. Large amount of peanut butter, oatmeal, sardines, some brown rice, canned vegetables, etc.