I get a kick out of the term "late-stage capitalism." It's so wonderfully apodictic and self-congratulatory. It implies that capitilsim is a disease, as if it didn't account for so much good in so many lives. And it assumes that capitalism must end just because we are running out of resources. In every possible respect, the term is wrong-headed, yet it persists, like most bad ideas whose time has come.

We need make make one simple adjustment to our view of capitalism to understand why it is not in its late stages. We must recognize that government, to the extent it represents the consensus of the people, is a place where capitalists, laborers, and consumers meet to agree on what the capitalist system will reward. For example, it might seem that everything would be cheaper if workers could be paid less. But consumers are ok with prices rising to support unionization and minimum wages. If the consumers weren't ok with that, they'd vote out the jerks who passed laws supporting those things.

The capitalists don't care. They just need to know what will be rewarded. If it's sustainability, fine. If it's community (Nextdoor.com), friendships (Facebook), Family (TheKnot.com) or nature (REI), capitalism is raring to go there.

An insurance executive I knew used to pooh-pooh inventing loss control measures. Such measures lowered risk, which lowered premiums, which lowered profits. Boo for capitalism. But the guy's insureds had plenty of reason to reduce their risks, because that would lower their premiums and their prices, which would bring in more customers. Yea for capitalism. You just have to look through the right end of the telescope.

Yes, the war for the last resources has begun, but people fought wars for resources before there was capitalism and they will fight wars for resources under capitalism. Whether anything will ever replace capitalism remains to be seen. The idea that production should be based on demand, discovered by granting rewards (profits) to those best able to meet it, seems hard to top. But I'm a man of my times, with all that that entails.