Capitalism, it's whatever we got.

Anyone big on history of economics out there?

So it is taken as an article of faith that the American economy is a "capitalist" one, but I was also taught that we simply use that term as short for "modified capitalism."

Here is the question: if the definition of capitalism is the lack of government involvement in the market, and if the "philosophical father" of capitalism, Adam Smith successfully showed that historically, corporations were an instrument of national mercantile economic war... and he defined capitalism (in wealth of nations) as the lack of corporations and monopoly,...

how did "modified capitalism" come to be the term that describes a system in which corporations, monopoly and nationalistic protectionism are the dominant force? Isn't that like calling the color BLACK "modified white?"

Or is "Capitalism" just the word for whatever the heck the US is doing at the time the word is used?