That’s one way capitalism can work. Capitalism, like anything created by humans, is complex. The way you described how capitalism works seems to put all the blame on the people with the least power or knowledge in the whole process.

Corporations have the money to advertise their products, bribe politicians, lobby governments, threaten or deal with whistleblowers, suppress information and research or destroy foreign environments for resources to continually gain more power. That’s not a complete list either. The things these entities would do to exploit everything to increase their quaterly profits is horrifying.

Where I live, our regional government official works hand in hand with businesses and corporations to completely gut health care and education while giving away all our green land to build more expensive homes.

If individuals truly had control over capitalism as you suggest, then they will soon be too tired from being over worked, sick from lack of healthcare, possibly homeless, and under educated to know any better to make better decisions, or fight back.

Corporations have the wealth to change things but it seems ruthless manipulation and exploitation are their favourite tools. I don’t see how these tools can continue endlessly on this finite planet. You can’t exploit a lifeless planet with dead slaves but they just can’t see past their quarterly profits.