I'm not sure what everybody expected, but when your economy is going up, up, up, up....
its got nowhere to go but down...
I saw the writing on the wall when I talked to American peers who made the same amount of money I did in Canada, but could afford sports cars, houses, big screen tv's, and top end P.C's because they had 'good credit'.
Also, when the trend in North America is buying houses; painting the walls, installing new door knobs and 'flipping' it for twice what its worth....and having 2 television channels with 10 shows doing just that.....how can anybody ignore those warning signs?!
Its easy to blame banks and governments, but I think many people bit off more than they could chew...and the result is that a lot of good, responsible people loose their jobs and houses as the economy tumbles down.