My wife recently had this happen to a work acquaintance. They are a recent immigrant who has only lived in New York since moving here, who was sent out to the Midwest where there is no public transportation and driving is mandatory, and is staying at a hotel. She lost her phone, and thus could not get anywhere or communicate with anyone, and couldn't pay for anything due to her phone being where all her money is stored (no physical credit cards or anything). Luckily, my wife was able to get her around and help her out until they eventually discovered it was in a lost and found. If she had been alone, I don't know what she would have done.

Imagine being on vacation and you lose your phone, or it breaks. You offloaded your payments to digital and have no cards or cash, you can't get in your hotel room because you used a digital key like hotels all want you to, maybe you brought a car but oops it's a Tesla and you're depending on your phone as the key because it's less stuff to carry!