I mean of course it doesn’t stay high once the shorts are covered. But everyone who sells to people with short positions will absolutely come out on top which is the point.
The real concern I have is the millions of people who blindly trust a financial advisor fresh out of college, who has never made a profitable trade in their life. We've all been told to buy into indexes and that we can retire rich. What happens when the market doesn't grow for 10 years? Why should the market continue to grow if the US loses its economic superiority and population growth in the US slows?
At the end of the day, a share of a single stock is only worth what someone else will pay for it. The company or business behind a share does not matter for the average retail investor, since by owning shares they really don't control much of anything. This particular WSB saga is a bunch of people trying to force some hedge funds to pay them more money for their shares than they are worth. It is as simple as that.