PE has become shorthand for "thing I don't like", and admittedly there are a lot of horrible evil people in PE. As a concept though, it's pretty benign.

So here are some positive things that I think PE funds can contribute:

1) Private equity serves as an exit path for small business builders. Suppose that you have built a small, profitable trucking company. Now you are old and want to retire. You kids have no interest in the business, and have already built different careers elsewhere than managing a fleet of Super Greats. Oftentimes, PE funds are only realistic buyers of your business.

2) At a more subtle level, PE can supply better management. For example, a supermarket owner I know accepted capital from a PE fund specifically to acquire better talent (his remark: "very talented people are rarely excited to operate a rural food & beverage shop").

3) PE-backed companies are, arguably, structurally better than the public counterparts. The cliche is that many public firms are run like third-world fiefdoms (the board are focused on empire building; the executives are spending money lavishly on perks). Most of these concerns vanish once each director are given a shared, transparent objective set by the deal structure. (As Henry Kravis often remarks, PE is mostly about alignment of the interests)

The growing role of PE in everything and everywhere is IMO a symptom of wealth inequality. PE didn't invest in veterinary practices, retirement homes, or plumbing businesses 30 years ago. They're just running out of places to put all that cash.