When a significant proportion of private debt is housing, it's the entire society's problem. (And the subprimes crisis illustrated the problem in a very obvious fashion).
Ironically, a significant part of public debt we have today still comes from the aftermath of the last private debt crisis we had: first as a (too timid) response to the 2008 banking crisis, then as the result of the economic crisis that ensued.
When an entire society is built on private debt, it doesn't matter if you don't own debt by yourself, this is a society problem, and thus it becomes your problem.
Also, unless you are super wealthy (and should be taxed more) it's unlikely that you'll stay debt-free for your entire life.
If govts did not play capturing huge masses of money to do favors and we limited ourselves to court and hearings when needed, people would be way more responsible in their actions and the services would be way more efficient and oriented to waht people want without excuses and make-up.
This is not how states operate, unfortunately, and they are not interested at all in making things change. People in the state live to a big extent from selling favors, whether we like it or not, via regulations and capturing money to make others happy. All, with our taxes.
I know many people do not think this way but if you took the time to read and understand the inner workings of politics and power you would almost never think well of a person whose job is professional politics.
