"Most people said they hadn鈥檛 really thought about where their stuff went after they sent it back"
I've been writing a little bit about "reverse logistics" & watched a pallet unboxing video last year for research...
https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/mystery-amazon-pallet-unboxing/
archive link: https://archive.ph/NO3Xo
2/ ofc since I don't work for Wirecutter, my conclusion is a good deal more dismal than "please buy as much as you want, just be a tiny bit more selective"
most of this stuff is headed quickly to a landfill from the moment it's created. we should all buy less, buy more secondhand, repair what we can