How is capitalism beneficial for the average person if the capitalist gets wealthy off your labour?

[James K]

Capitalism itself is not a problem.

Unregulated capitialism is. Capitalism cannot exist in a vacuum of no regulation: it must necessarily devolve into a libertarian paradise like Somalia (no regulations), or feudalism or monopoly (control of an entire market).

An unregulated or poorly regulated marketplace stifles innovation and prohibits new ideas and new products from entering the marketplace. A good example currently is the Comcast/Time Warner merger proposed. Without regulation it would go through without objection.

Already with the striking down of the FCC's Net Neutrality regulations by the courts and the commissioner of the FCC (a former lobbyist for the cable industry), Netflix customers are already reporting data slowdowns, and it seems likely that smaller Websites (such as a blog) will have to pay graft to allow their data to be transmitted at equal speeds. Comcast has already put the Weather Channel on notice that it may be banned from its network (as Comcast is promoting its own weather channel).