Y2K was a non-event because a LOT of people spent a lot of time and money preparing for it..
I led a project team that spent 1 year and $1.2MM “fixing” bugs in the chemical plant I worked in... Had we not prepared, it definitely would have been a big problem.
I was one of those.
The amazing thing was that I was getting hysterics about this from a couple educators in my Soroptimist club. They were preparing to buy survival food, etc. I put together a PowerPoint presentation showing the problem in very simple terms and also showed how we were fixing it. It calmed them right down.
I work in manufacturing and the worst that happened was that one day, all inventory in the plant showed as expired and unshipable. Problem was fixed before noon.
In my local grocery store, I picked up a packet of sauce which stated that it would be good until sometime in 1902. I pointed it out to the check out girl who was very confused until I started laughing.
I believe the hysteria was caused because we IT types knew the problem, but could not get the attention of the money men until the worst case scenarios were presented to them. But, no, once we got the funding, the problem was easily soved.