Most of the world has settled on capitalism because it solves a specific class of coordination problems really well, and targeted intervention can stave off the externalities enough to make the system bearable.
Slumps and unemployment aren't, like, an avoidable curse, but they're pretty damn hard to avoid, and so far no system has had real success.
It has also been plausibly argued that the great depression was lengthened (and possibly deepened) by things like the New Deal.
Social safety nets and technological progress do improve life outcomes a lot.
Yes, it's concentrations of power which are the real enemy.
Unfortunately, no matter how many dictatorships, oligarchies, monarchies, theocracies and kleptocracies the world suffers through, we never seem to learn that lesson.
ask an investor if they would rather invest in a monopoly or not a monopoly.
seems like the only thing standing in the way of a world full of monopolies is corporate founders egos not willing to sell out for more profits.
There were good reasons why Bretton Woods failed in 1970, but the subsequent ascendance of Hayekian neoliberalism doesn't look so good 40 years on.
That very concept is a nonsensical. No Hayekian economist or ideologue calls themselves neoliberal.
[0] The Freeman, 1952. https://mises.org/library/freeman-july-1952-b
[1] Globalists. The End of Empire and the Birth of Neoliberalism.
> Professor Hayek is also probably right in saying that in this country the intellectuals are more totalitarian-minded than the common people. But he does not see, or will not admit, that a return to ‘free’ competition means for the great mass of people a tyranny probably worse, because more irresponsible, than that of the State. The trouble with competitions is that somebody wins them. Professor Hayek denies that free capitalism necessarily leads to monopoly, but in practice that is where it has led, and since the vast majority of people would far rather have State regimentation than slumps and unemployment, the drift towards collectivism is bound to continue if popular opinion has any say in the matter.
I'm not sure why more democracy doesn't solve both issues, while retaining the benefits of both, which seems to be where most modern nations are broadly headed, in fits and starts.