From Mother Jones' issue on Private Equity Asset Stripping of America

[ancianita]

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2022/05/private-equity-buyout-kkr-houdaille/

... In the last decade, private equity has taken control of more than 80 retailers, leading to the loss of 1.3 million jobs. A firm named for the Ayn Rand character Howard Roark has bought up so many restaurants that it now employs nearly 1 million fast-food workers nationwide, all while successfully lobbying Congress to kill legislation mandating a $15 minimum wage. Private equity incursions into real estate have left no form of housing unscathed, driving up the costs of both owning and renting any type of house or apartment or mobile home. They’ve bought up for-profit colleges, driving down graduation rates while increasing student debt. They’ve sought gains in the obscure crevices of our mutual existence, from contact lenses to port-a-potties to ketchup. And they’ve enveloped the health care sector, including hospitals, dermatologists, ophthalmologists, veterinarians, hospice care, and nursing homes, often leading to increased medical costs for patients and a drop in the quality of care. A 2021 study from a group of business school professors found that private equity ownership of nursing homes increased their Medicare billing and upped the mortality of patients by 10 percent—about 20,000 lives across the 12-year period they studied...

... In 2020, prompted by GOP megadonor and Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman, then-President Trump’s Labor Department issued a ruling allowing private equity firms to invest the money held in 401(k) accounts, subjecting the retirement savings of Americans to higher fees and the risk of, at worst, losing their entire investment. Biden’s campaign at the time called the move “another example of President Trump putting the interests of Wall Street ahead of American workers and families.” But in December of last year, Biden’s Labor Department quietly issued its own ruling, leaving the Trump-era changes intact.

This aversion to stricter regulation of private equity means its dominance will only grow, says Appelbaum, and so will cutting costs and corners and jobs to extract financial gain. The evidence can be seen in small inconveniences: the decision by a PE-owned hospital, for instance, to buy the cheapest, roughest paper towels for nurses who wash their hands dozens of times a day. Or in broader indignities: a PE-owned ­hospice care company that provides fewer visits to dying patients by medical assistants who are cheaper to employ, but for whom the company can bill Medicare the same amount as for a visit by a nurse. And then there is life-altering damage: medical bills that gut family finances all because private equity firms have bought up so much of the health care sector that they can charge virtually anything.

“Right now, they can do whatever they want,” Appelbaum says. “And that means quality of life deteriorates for everybody.”

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/25-largest-private-equity-firms-chart/

[alwaysinasnit]

1. On the money! Thanks for posting ancianita.

[ancianita]

2. Hi, alwaysinasnit! Happy to, but really not happy about dystopia.

[alwaysinasnit]

3. Every day that I wake up, my gut churns in dread because I can feel how close we are to the

abyss. I have no solutions. All I can do is donate, march, and urge others to open their eyes and see what is coming. To see that the light at the end of the tunnel is the headlight of an oncoming train.

[ancianita]

4. Same for me. The dread darkens every way I try to get through my days.

Amen. Even a local Florida store down by the coast posts it.

[alwaysinasnit]

5. Well, at least we can metaphorically hold hands here at DU and gain a bit of comfort with

like-minded people.

[ancianita]

7. Yes, my only comfort. I'm glad we're here for each other. Glad DU is here for us, too

[slightlv]

6. Ye gods! We truly have a horrendous job ahead of us...

This country is so far off the rails, is there any way to get it back on track?! Thank you for posting the article, important information to know and understand. I knew from years ago this was happening. It was covered fairly well when Mitt Romney ran for office. After all, his company was tops at doing it. Hubby and I began likening it to the old 1980's phrase "deregulated"... which meant higher prices, lower quality, no service. Today, we hear of a private equity firm buying a company, and we automatically say to each other, "another company bites the dust." The process and end result is so predictable, it -ought- to be illegal.

But so should a lot of things be illegal in this country, IMNSHO. CEO's making 100's of times more than their highest paid employees should be illegal. Golden parachutes should be illegal. The whole way Wall Street functions should be examined carefully and judiciously.

There's graft and corruption at all levels of government, from local to state to federal and in all departments. And there's no common sense where the money is concerned. You end up penalized in a coming year because you didn't spend all your allotment in the preceding year. Doesn't say much for a "savings" mentality, does it? And the biggest argument FOR telecommuting is savings of all kinds for everyone; but trying to convince old management is like trying to pull out an embedded molar. The damn thing just won't move.

And even if you map out a plan and begin working to make things "right" again, you have people fighting you; not only those who are directly profiting from those areas you're trying to clean up, but also the idiots who are getting hurt by these people but are too stupid to stop and realize it. Or somehow think it's a test from God we're cheating them out of, or something like that.

Like I said, how in the world do we get the country back on the right track with so much to do, so much of it deeply embedded systemically, and half the country fighting against your every move and word.

Private equity used to be a good, functional asset in the world of finance. It used to help fund important things like research, etc. But, like with most things financial controlled by humans, greed (and power) blackens the heart and corrupts. Somedays, I wish I could be Samantha Stevens and just wiggle my nose and make it all different. Even if it was only in black and white.

[ancianita]

12. "and half the country fighting against your every move and word." At most, right wing voters

only amount to 22% of the country (74 million divided by 335 million). But when the leaders of the 74 million are given amplified media voice, they seem to be more formidable.

We have to hold onto the reality that Steve Schmidt lays out ...

[CrispyQ]

8. Great private equity graphic at that 2nd link! Worth the click.

There's always been a contingent that was "everything for profit" but IMO, as a species we see the downhill trajectory we're on & now everyone's just trying to "git what they can while the gittin's still good."

[ancianita]

9. Indeed, just for the name recognition & major steals. What hurts is how alone Warren has been in

going after these asset strippers. I really hadn't any notion of how big a private equity flood our politicians have swum in, but now I see that even our party is bought enough not to legislate. We lose her expertise and talent as head of the SEC position or some cabinet post because of our razor thin majority number.

The Senate increase is everything -- 60 or past it.

[CrispyQ]

10. All who voted in 2020 need to vote this November as repubs keep stacking the deck against us. -nt

[ancianita]

11. I hopehopehope the 81 million who voted for Biden turn out again.

[appalachiablue]

13. Thanks. The usual suspects- Blackstone, Warburg, Bain, Carlyle, Blackrock + more...

[SharonAnn]

14. Should say "How Oligrachs are Stripping America" Private Equity Oligarchs

[ancianita]

15. More limiting, though, than their subsidiaries who obtain & strip assets on behalf of hedge funds.