Yup, but on in addition to the debt piled up onto some companies by the private equity firms — there’s an even larger group out there; private companies whose original owners “leveraged up” all on their own (because money was cheap to borrow, it allowed quick “growth”, and much like the HELOC’s allowed homeowners to use their houses as ATM’s the “leverage” allowed owners to do the same with their own companies) — only problem is that all that “growth” doesn’t do them any good selling into a deflating market, and with idle equipment and short staff (to get “lean” meant trimmed to the bone) there’s no room for them to really “cut” expenses, and no way to really carry the loans anymore w/or selling assets (into a depressed market w few buyers)… so a lot of companies effectively committed “delayed suicide.”

The only possible “upside” to this is that within a few years a lot of “relatively new” used equipment will be hitting the streets at bargain basement prices — cheap resources for new companies to use (if they can get their hands on it) — which might eventually help with the recovery a half-decade hence.