Industrialization, constitutional democracy, science, regulation, and unions have raised standards of living for the majority of people. You forget history if you don't remember things like the Battle of Blair Mountain (first aerial bombardment on US soil) or the Triangle Shirtwaist factory, not to mention the incredible death and misery inflicted by that first capitalistic country Britain. The free market does not feel very free to the vast majority of people who have to deal with incredibly oppressive companies and plutocrats, and when laws and police are geared to oppressing the poor and the jobless.

Do not take me to advocate for centralized planning, but we do have to have democratic governmental intervention to prevent the free market from chewing us all up and spitting us out.