Capitalism: Is it Working?

[Mister Agenda]

Isn't it important to note here..that saying "on land provided by the government" attenuates the situation and may not really describe the full brunt of it?

If we continued to say -On land provided by the government - who had a glut of land and nothing to do with it, who hoped to glean the benefits that the railroads offered as infrastucture (but frequently found themselves in the position of not having been as clever as the railroads operators) -and land acquired from private citizens - on the backs of exploitative labor -and with the assistance of the media in forming public opinion - the private ownership of -all- means of production.

Land in general was cheap, but land along ideal railroad routes was very valuable. But yes, it's an oversimplification to focus on that alone.

I also don't think that capitalism on it's own actually solves problems of inefficient resource allocation...as we should all be fully aware that there's a profit to be made in allocating resources inefficiently...... At best it might offer a heuristic - but without understanding why it works (or doesn't) I could hardly call this a solution.

Private ownership of the means of production with the aim to produce a profit. Isn't this all that capitalism is? What sense does it make then to call it a problem solver? If your problem is that the means of production are not privately owned...and no one is looking to make a profit..and you wish that they were - then capitalism can solve this problem, sure..but going too much farther is a stretch. I suppose this cuts to the question in the OP. Is capitalism working? Are the means of production privately owned, are people looking to make a profit? If so then yes, but the rest of this stuff....something else is required, because "efficient allocation of resources" is not required for capitalism to "work"..nor does it seem to be offering that service by the sheer weight of it's own simple principle.

It's a result of decentralized competition. Each enterprise has to struggle to remain competitive in a shifting economic landscape of varying demand and supply and price. Those that fail to find some edge or niche fail, and the resources that went into them go elsewhere. But you're right, that's a consequence of allowing capitalism, not capitalism itself.

But it does 'seem to be offering that service by sheer weight of its own simple principle'; unless you know of an economic system that allocates resources more efficiently on the same scale?

Caveat: market efficiency is not the be-all and end-all goal of society. Of course we introduce market inefficiencies in order to secure other goods we value more highly. As long as we're willing to pay the cost of those other goods (reduced market efficiency), I don't see anything wrong with it.