Dr David Savage discusses 'panic buying'

Wednesday, 29 April 2020

Stocking up to prepare for a crisis isn’t ‘panic buying’. It’s actually a pretty rational choice.

David Savage

As the COVID-19 pandemic began there were countless reports of shoppers clearing out supermarket shelves from Wuhan and Hong Kong to Singapore and Milan in response to the spread of coronavirus. This behaviour is often described as “panic buying”.

However, the research shows that what’s going on here might have nothing to do with panic. It’s possible that this a perfectly rational response to the situation.

Dr David Savage and his colleague, Professor Benno Torgler of QUT, have discussed this phenomenon in their article on The Conversation.

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