With joint-stock corporations, investors can place bets on the success of many different companies, without having to play a central management role in any one of them. This allows investors to diversify their financial holdings. It also allows them to capture profits on their investments, without having to get involved in the dirty, troublesome business of actually running a company.

Indeed, if communist central planners could have organized the economy with as much detail, precision, and flexibility as a modern-day Toyota or Wal-Mart, communism would probably still exist.

Economic systems come, and economic systems go. No economic system lasts forever. Capitalism is not likely to last forever, either.

Competition-ruthless, unforgiving, to-the-death competition-is a crucial feature of capitalism.

Try this: say the words "global, global, global" aloud several times, as fast as you can. You'll find yourself sounding like a turkey ("gobble, gobble, gobble").

Capitalism, in contrast, has existed for fewer than 300 years. If the entire history of Homo sapiens was a 24-hour day, then capitalism has existed for two minutes.

Apart from their work and production, households perform other important economic functions. Most CONSUMPTION occurs within the household. ... In developed capitalist economies, private consumption spending accounts for half or more of GDP.