It might seem like a silly question, and the answer depends on who you ask. From an economic view, though, it doesn’t look terribly complicated.  Certainly, the dictionary definition is straightforward. Capitalism is an economic system defined by the private ownership of capital. But there’s a lot of assumed knowledge in a definition like that, so let’s define some terms. Private ownership simply means something is owned by individuals or companies rather than the government. While this concept seems straightforward, it can get a bit confusing when we talk about “public” versus “private” companies. In economics, “private” means exactly what …