Apropos of nothing ..

... a post inspired by m,y wife (which is not say she agrees).

The Merriam-Webster's definition of capitalism reads as follows: "an economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods, by investments that are determined by private decision, and by prices, production, and the distribution of goods that are determined mainly by competition in a free market." As opposed, presumably, to the ownership of such goods being in the hands of the state. But note that capital goods are a common and essential ingredient in both cases. In other words, the difference is between private capitalism and state capitalism, the point being that you can't have a complex economy without capital goods. I mention this because, when I hear people ranting against capitalism, I realize they are underinformed about economics or they are tossing about slogans for purpsoes of propaganda. The underlying economic issue has to do with who controls the capital goods. History seem to suggest that the widest and most varied control is best - for no other reason than that the alternatives are all worse.

Dictionaries record how words are used, but words are often used loosely and imprecisely. Socrates made a career out of questioning what would have been in his day dictionary definitions of key terms such as beauty. Dictionary definitions are snapshots. The words keep moving.