[kefka]

And that answer is what is wrong with capitalism.

Why can a drug maker jack their prices up 100x? Because it's profitable.

Why do gas companies raise their prices when there's an impending disaster (hurricane, blizzards, etc.)? Because they can.

Capitalism is great in a different aspect: it provides a form of unaccountable eugenics. Your parents were poor, and went to a public school that wasn't funded well. That travels along with life, leading to a harder life for you. Less money for the essentials, and perhaps health insurance.

There's nobody out there with a knife going to kill you; it's more of ling-chi or death by a thousand cuts. And the culmination amounts to moralizations like "You should have went to better school", or "Its your fault not getting a better job", or insults of "Lazy".

But your lifespan is shortened; there's less everything for you. And society has no one to blame except you. Well, other than every other actor who causes tiny bits of pain and suffering... but not enough to quantify. Not like they could sue, anyways.

[jshevek]

I agree with you the first three stanzas of your post, but is this what is wrong with "capitalism", or is this what is wrong with "the way we are currently doing capitalism" ?

[kefka]

Capitalism, the economic theory as posited by Adam Smith in "The Wealth of Nations" fails when stuff approaches infinity.

We already have a taste of it with the internet, where it's 'Create once, share everywhere'. The idea of scarcity is forced via legal tools, where scarcity means little.

And now, with cheap solar, leads to cheap/free energy. And robots are creating more and more goods. And we're on the cusp of a level 4 vehicle automation systems. As this trend continues, many things will approach 'infinity' the same way they do already online.

What does that mean? It means that people could have the requirements of life provided as a citizenship right: food, water, shelter, electricity, internet, plus a bit more. Unlike the older socialism and communism systems, that required people be slaves to the state and work in prescribed manners, robots and computers could be the provider of these essential resources.

And that starts looking at post-capitalism systems. Would there be money? Of course. Some resources would still be rare. But this idea of "go to work so you can eat and survive" would no longer be hanging over people's heads like a guillotine.