As the severity of the coronavirus pandemic becomes more and more obvious, people all over the United States are rushing to supermarkets and scooping just about everything off the shelves.
Panic buying is understandable, says David Savage, associate professor of behavioral economics at the University of Newcastle in Australia. “It is rational to prepare for something bad,” Savage told the BBC. However, “it is not rational to buy 500 cans of baked beans.”
Most of the time, essential items aren't in short supply; producers just can't ship them to stores fast enough. Take a breath and channel your efforts elsewhere. There are plenty of genuinely useful things you can do to protect yourself during this frightening time.
Here are 20 things you might think you need to hoard but don't:
Advertisement
Page 1 / 21
Advertisement
Subscribing to Moneywise Has Its Rewards
Hello! You’ve found us by way of our phenomenal lifestyle content, but did you know Moneywise is best known for producing thoroughly researched personal finance content, written by the smartest personal finance writers in the industry?
If you subscribe to Moneywise—for free—you’ll receive a twice-weekly personal finance newsletter that makes you smarter about your money.
*Subscribers must be logged in for display advertising to be disabled. Ad-free refers only to display advertising. Content on Moneywise often contains affiliate offers. It would be impractical to remove these from content for subscribers. Furthermore, Moneywise believes linked products and services add sincere value to the content. With that being said, please be aware articles may still contain affiliate offers. These offers will be clearly marked in line with our advertising guidelines.
†Terms and Conditions apply.