Enjoyed your musing, but regarding capitalism, it depends on the metrics/values used.
If one goes back a few decades a family could have a comfortable life with a single wage earner, eg what is often called the traditional family unit. Compare that with today. Are ‘we’ better off today or were we better off in a previous time where one could keep their heads above water while maintaining a decent standard of living? The mega wealthy have acquired $billions while the low end have acquired bigger $debts and poverty - noting poverty is relative, but.
Today an article stated 22 men have more wealth than 326 million women in Africa. I can only assume those 326 million women might be better off than they were a few decades ago, but I can be fairly certain those 22 men are living well and not without.
Some versions of capitalism and Christianity that are in vogue today can be paraphrased as ‘God and the system rewards those who take and are best at taking’ and the discredited trickle down affect where everyone supposedly wins something even if not much, is that if you feed a horse enough oats some will eventually be dropped along the road for the scavengers to enjoy.
I know you are familiar with the characterisations to the above, and this is not intended to be argumentative, just the counterpoint to parts of your post from a differing viewpoint.
