simon simple lewis " telling convincing stories about why the household sector balance was evolving the way it did over the two decades before the recession"

that makes sense

we had households fueled mostly by  wage incomes stagnating
and lossening credit standards thru the cycles
with usury rates falling
the process was self limiting
after a few cycles this macro spending  gimmick exhausted itself
rates bottomed  out
 credit standards over reached

so eventualy
when it was once again time for collaterals to take a  market value dip
 when the  credit system's  turkey rope tightened ...blah blah blah

as with most cycle climactics
in the popular narrative
the fire sector's  usual if various
 clown and scoundrel  panics
with all the  Ciceronian  ham ups
 that induces
   got all the headlines