Comment by sershe

"cannot think of a single success story with PE that has created a successful company that hasn't imploded. I belive most PE funds lose money too. Why anyone would buy a company that a PE fund has gotten its hooks into is beyond me."

It's funny that the narrative where a bunch of generally smart well connected people renowned for their greed set money on fire for decades doesn't make you rethink your priors.

There's actually a fair amount of research.

Pure performance https://www.nber.org/digest/jul12/private-equity-performance

Effects on employment and productivity E.g. https://www.nber.org/digest/feb20/economic-effects-private-e... Notable numbers for me are for public vs private firms. Apparently principal - agent problem is a real thing!

Tangential on how betting your own money is more efficient than other's https://www.nber.org/papers/w13061