As private equity investment in health care has surged to almost $1 trillion over the past decade — funding new technologies, clinical trials and more — a lack of transparency has made it hard to assess whether the industry is also putting patients at risk.

America’s approach to health care is an outlier among the world’s rich countries, and not in a good way. Extraordinarily complex and hideously expensive, it still manages to leave some 26 million people without coverage.

One big reason the global financial system nearly collapsed in 2008 was that banks had shifted risks into the shadows, relying on insurance-like instruments that proved incapable of absorbing losses.

Around the world, major cities are struggling with a severe crisis: Housing has become so expensive that it’s repelling skilled workers, undermining growth and even fomenting political extremism.