I know of one rather arbitrary arbitration date.   It's the expiration date on bottles of "Melaleuca Oil" - the brand of melaleuca, or "tea tree", oil produced and marketed by Melaleuca, Inc. There has been no "expiration" date established for the melaleuca oil (at least of the quality of their product) - i.e., the oil seems to last almost indefinitely. But the company put a date on the product "to encourage people to use it" rather than just keeping it around (for emergencies?).   I can understand why a date would help "rotate" the stock, but that oil is too expensive to be throwing it away unnecessarily just because of some arbitrary date on the bottle.   I'm inclined to think that many "sell by" or "use by" or "expiration" dates on products are overly cautious/conservative - i.e., to bend over backwards to avoid stale or less potent products to be consumed but with little concern about products being unnecessarily thrown out.

Again, I'd really like good information on which products are really dangerous and under what conditions. I have some of that, e.g., re fresh meat (especially chicken), milk, mayonnaise, egg salad, but there are many products about which I'm still kind of in the dark.

Back in my grandma's day, canned goods were kept in the "cellar," where it was quite dry and not over about 50 degrees.   She also kept tomatoes, apples, potatoes, and other veggies from the garden there, packed in straw, and they would last all winter.   Our modern pantries are seldom as good for food storage.