Jet fleets at companies purchased through leveraged buyouts are at least 40 percent smaller than at similar publicly traded firms, Bloomberg reported.

Buyout funds soared leading up to the recession, and the financial discipline imposed by companies bought by private equity firms has included cutting perks that some executives may have taken for granted.

According to a study published in January by Federal Reserve economist Jesse Edgerton, companies bought by private-equity firms are 32 percent less likely to have a jet in the three years after the deal closes than in the year before.

“What the good investors do is go into a company, look for fat, and these guys are pretty good at removing it,” said Steven Kaplan of the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business. “The trick is not to remove the muscle with the fat.”

The annual cost of operating a corporate jet can run as much as $5 million, Edgerton said in his report, though $1 million is typical. Buyout funds completed deals valued at a record $1.3 trillion from 2005 to 2007, Bloomberg said.