andifeelfine
33782
890
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https://boingboing.net/2025/07/11/public-libraries-fight-private-equity-takeovers.html
Jul 11, 2025 10:15 PM
andifeelfine
33782
890
25
https://boingboing.net/2025/07/11/public-libraries-fight-private-equity-takeovers.html
LibrarianOfThunder
Well now I'm sad 😢
unluckyandbored
Private equity buys libraries, then bulldozes them to build more luxury condos!
IanKacprzak
People try to fearmonger about Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, but the only equity you should hate is private equity
boumboum34
"...toy stores, and Sears"??? Didn't Toys 'R Us and Sears both go bankrupt, precisely because of these Equity vultures?
NKato
I see a name that deserves a rather violent, yet non-lethal, response.
ToSisPoS
They already have privatized libraries. They’re fucking called bookstores.
QuentinUnknown
Then it's no longer a library. It's a book barn....
shitheadtookmyname
Wow I didn't think it was possible to hate anything more than I hate Trump
YeastInfectedWhiskerBiscuit
Anything private equity touches, it destroys.
whereismymind86
If the choices are private equity or burning all the libraries to the ground, I might consider the latter. To call private equity firms a cancer is an insult to cancer.
Toqom
Private equity firms cause people to die, they help no one but the rich assholes who run them to make themselves richer by destroying lives. Fucking evil
doctorId
I knew it was only a matter of time before libraries were gonna start getting replaced by PragerU book stores.
Comet260
Private equity needs to be destroyed.
fibbertitgibbet
I wonder if all of this will saw the same way it sees right now once there's a dem majority, and the US becomes some flavour of Europe for a few decades.
giraffinator
So sick of this bollocks
DeppityDepp
Having worked as a librarian he has clearly never tried the job.
Under funded, under staffed and over worked.
I went down with stress because I could not keep up with the workload, and I like being busy.
“Their policies are all about job security. That’s why the profession is nervous about us. You can go to a library for 35 years and never have to do anything and then have your retirement. We’re not running our company that way. You come to us, you’re going to have to work.”
swephisto
Your country sucks
SomeGeek75ygh
Destroy all public equity firms and kill all the leeches.
Wikitoria
America, at the forefront of the enshitifacation process since day one.
SavageDrums
Capitalism's global avatar
Closetnuzzlepuzzla
The more Australia distances itself from the absolutely saturated toxic culture of the US, the better. We need to be influenced by cultures with better morals in future. Following America nearly broke us
gayvillian
Private equity is responsible for thousands of closures and around a million people losing their jobs in the past decade alone. Something like 2/3 of retail closures were due to private equity and not indicative of the actual businesses profitability. I haven't seen a single story about a company that was taken over by private equity and became more profitable and hired more people. It's the business equivalent of stage 4 cancer.
picklesue
Vulture capitalists
naomiki
The oder i get, the more everything feels like "yesterday." What baffles me is how much can be done and not be done during that "shot" amount of time
WaxedApple
The only way to save ourselves is to put every private equity partner in a submersible to explore the Titanic and then let nature take its course. They can't be reformed. They just have to explore the Titanic.
circlebreaker
Hypothetically speaking, what do you think might be the best way to get those ghoulish freaks sealed into oil barrels and dumped overboard in the middle of the Pacific Ocean? Strictly a a thought experiment on how to keep them too terrified to destroy society from behind a desk, remember. NSFW
justalittlelightning
There are several types of PE
There's a lot of value in roll ups in middle markets where you can consolidate smaller businesses and give the proprietor a pay out, and the staff benefits from scale. We saw this in the funerary services business the last decade. https://www.google.com/amp/s/kffhealthnews.org/news/article/funeral-homes-private-equity-death-care/amp/
Obviously, individual owners make the choice to sell so
I don't know who is unhappy about that...aside from the obvious morbidity.
justalittlelightning
We were starting to see it in Solar installers in 22 before interest rates ballooned. It was funny to see this whole value chain emerge where small PE would round up 5-10 small family run businesses. They'd get in at like 0.8-1.5x revenue, but then the consolidated entity would benefit from some economies of scale and sell for 2-3x revenue to another PE firm looking to do a regional consolidation.
Its hilarious to me that they are like little bundling workshops
Leaps
Its almost like if we had a functioning government it would be illegal.
guitarfourtysix
Yep. The firms "rescue them" by buying them out. Then they rob it blind for two years then go bankrupt and write everything off.
FermentTheRich3000
They take out a loan to buy the company so they aren't really investing anything. Then they sell every asset they can, keep the money and leave the company with the debt for the loan previously mentioned and no assets.
Sageypie
Worse, the money spent to buy the company is immediately put on the books as a debt, and worse still, it's a debt that has to be paid immediately, natter what needs to be gutted from the company to make that happen. It's insane.
"Yeah, let us buy your company, we'll give you two million dollars for it,.money that you can invest into upgrades and...fuck you, hand the money back, we effectively paid nothing for your business and now we need to justify buying this place to our investors"
ClessAurion
They are a necessary kind of bussines, but have been hijacked by greed and people trying to make the most money at any cost.
Wanna bet anything they will be the cause of a recession not too far in the future like subprime were in 2008?
ElbowDeepInAPoliceState
What necessary function do they fulfill? When did they primarily fulfill this function instead of being corporate raiders and otherwise scummy?
ClessAurion
Fair question. It is something hard to see with how greedy and corrupt they are now.
Failing companies can be brought to a good standing again often through reforms and cuts from outside experts.
Sometimes through very tough measures, same kind of logic as doctors amputating a leg because it has gangrenated.
Problem is, they've turned into a money loop scheme to make money through loans taking advantage of holes in the system.
vegivamp
You can get an outside expert to do that without selling the company to them. And if they're worth their salt, it should not be a problem for them to do it for a normal manager wage, with an end bonus conditional on agreed success measures.
Anything else?
gayvillian
What notable companies have been "saved" and then expanded scale and increased wages and benefits after acquisition?
bladderinfection
License the library contract to a Money-Is-God.Com type company, right wing leaning of course, and the propaganda writes itself at this point.
UncleMeaty
A library is not really a great for-profit business model.
andifeelfine
...yet. They'll run it like a blockbuster.
kewakl
profit is not the motive here. destroying a public service is the motive
DirectorFury
Profit is why they're destroying this public service
kewakl
We love the poorly educated, so get destroy any means for the electorate to KNOW ANYTHING other than what the regime feeds them.
"The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command. "
Raventhief
I don't read no books, so if sumone wanna make money off dem woke-ass libruls readin' books, let 'em!
baals
https://media4.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPWE1NzM3M2U1MHYyZWZtZTdidmdvNmR4amNkdGp5ZW50ejU3cmFqcGpmaTIybjVqNyZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/cFRCnloR286cZFw62o/200w.webp
Raventhief
This is sarcasm, btw.
clonedeeznuts
Of course. But the problem is they don't want anyone but them and their racist friends to make money.
brendino87
https://media4.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPWE1NzM3M2U1bjJhYzgzMmdjNXE3dGZwNGQ0d25xczM5cGZ0ZWo3dHRrdmk1bGlibSZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/3ohs81K6uRxuejjHHi/200w.webp
PaleChapter
I am required to state that violence is not the answer. Under no circumstances should these people be hit with bricks until their faces are as ugly as their souls. That would be wrong.
CycloneSP
correct, violence is not the answer. it's the question. the answer to that question is for each one of you to determine on your own.
Marikhen
At no point should a a library owned by a private equity firm have its books burned with the PEF's leadership locked inside the building.
PaleChapter
Get the books out first, please.
Marikhen
Only if there are any books worth saving, and I have sincere doubts that a private equity firm would leave much, if anything, worth saving because their goal is to maximize profits for themselves to the detriment of everything else.
meganical
People that like or treasure books aren’t violent
Comet260
You sure about that, choomba?
EekumBokumEekumBokum
That's a dumb generalization.
MrPengy
What a weird thing to say.
originalhuman
We surely have never met then
anjeleyezjr
I love books. Love them. If I wasn't able to disappear into one, I would become violent.
azarza
You are wrong
EchoPMIM
Is it really violence if what you're destroying isn't a person, though?
dickdrizzle2
I like books. I would like it if private equity assholes got hurt, as well.
eggmuffin
What a bizarre thing to say...