Ms Davidson said Scotland had to ask itself whether it wanted to become like Greece, "borrowing and spending vast sums of other people's money in the hope and expectation of never being called to account", or like Germany, where "saving is a virtue and debt is shameful".

BBC: Scots Tory leader Ruth Davidson makes economy call

Federal tax policy creates the incentive through IRAs for people to put their retirement money at risk in stocks and bonds in the expectation they will earn higher returns than they could elsewhere.

FORBES: How To Profit From The Fiscal Cliff

The government relaxed planning laws, the banks threw money at anything involving cement, and investors gobbled up houses in the expectation that prices could only go up.

ECONOMIST: When the roof fell in

The expectation of higher returns on capital in America has attracted foreign money and made it easy to finance America's big current-account deficit in recent years.

ECONOMIST: Productivity growth: To these, the spoils | The

On top of all this, the FDIC and other bank regulators recently issued a policy statement declaring that banks, which hold about one-third of money market assets, should not "create an expectation that the bank will prop up" their own money market funds in the event of a breaking-the-buck incident.

FORBES: Breaking The Buck And Passing It, Too

When the 2012 funding plan was drawn up it was with the expectation there would be ample private money available but the government has now stepped in.

BBC: Crunch continues to hit 2012 fund