Swedes?

Well, if what you say about the Swedes is true, that would in fact explain it. The couple projects I've known about that went over budget or over time, well, basically, it didn't go over the *estimated* budget or time. A manager would have a conversation like "What's the quickest time this project can be done in?" "One month" "OK, finish it in two weeks". Shock! It took a month, so the project went 100% over on time.