The seeds of that devastation were sown throughout the last several decades regardless. But I think he's right in that the days of the whole country pursuing 3000+ sq ft homes and Suburbans and staying perpetually on maximum consumer debt are coming to an end. Self induced banker-political problems notwithstanding, we as a nation are slowly morphing into a more sustainable lifestyle mindset and thats a very good thing. Its still in our DNA to travel either way, so a more grounded fiscal foundation for the consumer over all will bode well for us, or at least less worse than the alternative (max debt until mass default, wash rinse repeat).