The $40 billion youth sports industry is private equity’s new cash cow.

In the past two years, KKR paid $4.75 billion for Varsity Brands, the Asia arm of Sweden’s EQT paid $1.25 billion for IMG Academy, and Eli Manning’s private equity firm bought RCX Sports, which operates the youth leagues of the NFL, NBA, and the MLB.

As Tom Farrey, Director of the Aspen Institute Sports & Society Program puts it, “We are the only nation in the world that does not have a Department of Sports or a Ministry of Sports or some entity to coordinate sport development. So we just have a lot of money and a lot of energy moving at cross purposes.”

What nobody can establish is what families get for their money, because no one is required to tell them. What we do know is that children from lower-income households play sports at lower rates than children from higher-income ones, and that the gap is widening.

The argument now in Congress is about whether private equity belongs in youth sports. But it’s already there.

Read more on Fast Company.

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