This is a very interesting article. As an Illumination editor, I saw it come in and hopped into it from the top of the queue because I knew I would want to engage with it. It's interesting that you say Friedman has been taken out of context, because I often see interviews with scholars who blame him for the profit-above-all-else mentality that has corrupted and perverted capitalism. I often note that Adam Smith has been taken out of context. I have written: "The 1%'s have perverted capitalism, and worse they quote Adam Smith out of context. Smith's Wealth of Nations posited that free-markets would lead to wealth fairly distributed among the citizens based on their contribution. We do not have free markets. We have markets twisted by laws written by lobbyists for large corporations and too-wealthy-individuals. Capitalism has been perverted into a Darwinian game of survival at the top of the food chain at the expense of others. As spiritual beings, humans are not supposed to act like animals. Our rigged system of capitalism is actually pathologically narcissistic as one succeeds not based upon their intelligence but upon their capacity to manipulate and take advantage of other people." As I understand Smith, he felt profit incentive was necessary for innovation and the starting of new ventures, but that eventually, profits would decrease and wages would increase. That cannot happen in a global economy where manufacturing is shifted to where labor is cheap.

On another note, I have a draft sitting in my folder for a long time about how the stock markets have destroyed the ability for capitalism to function in a socially responsible fashion, as it makes corporations value profit above the quality of their products, and play the numbers game of how much would it cost to make a product safer and better vs how much they need to spend on insurance and liability settlements, for example.