When the cookie crumbles

I was reading a Slate article tonight about how the credit crisis is somewhat "in our heads". I don't agree -- I think it's largely, if simplistically, explained by saying most people (and governments) have been living beyond their means. The article poses this question:

If all the banks, student loans, and credit-card companies that had extended credit to you demanded payment now, would you be able to make good?

And I realised that, for me, the answer is 'yes'. I don't have much in the way of savings. My remaining student loan and credit card debt, which my parents helped me 'refinance' a few years ago, is down to about $1000, I think. My credit cards, I pay off monthly. I only use them for the airmiles.

I have a good job with decent pay, so I'm lucky, though I'm also in the 'tech' sector so my industry can be volatile, and my situation could change. But in the end, I can say pretty honestly that I haven't been living beyond my means. I rent my accommodation. I have a motorcycle that I own outright because I paid cash for it.

Am I so unusual? Is everybody else leveraged up to their eyeballs? Should I be owning a small but extravagantly expensive house here in London and driving a Jag? Goodness knows everybody else in my neighborhood seems to be...