Supply-chain experts agree that consumers fueled the everything shortage – and might be able to help fix it

Supply-chain experts agree that consumers fueled the everything shortage – and might be able to help fix it

The global supply chain has been , and experts say consumers are more than partly to blame. From panic-buying to 2-day shipping expectations, . Insider spoke with 12 experts in labor, logistics, and economics who said shoppers are at least partially to blame for the supply-chain disruptions that and spawned "We're a community [of consumers] that supports a very short-term view of things, and by doing so, we're taking away from any resiliency in the supply chain," Gad Allon, the director of the University of Pennsylvania's Jerome Fisher Program in Management and Technology, told Insider. Surges in demand paired with at ports and warehouses left supply-chain workers struggling to make up lost ground. The largest US port has and 28% less workers to handle unloading products. In 2020, , and spending continues to balloon. In the first half of 2021, global consumer spending was up 22% year-over-year — a $3.2 trillion increase, according to Tony Pelli, practice director of security and resilience at BSI. Demand grew so rapidly in the past two years that it's equivalent to about 50 million new Americans joining the economy, Jonathan Gold, vice president of supply chain policy at the National Retail Federation, told Insider.