Ah, that's what I thought. You equate capitalism with cowboy capitalism.
There is not one global economy, but we can say that all economies have become part of a global setting. Each still have their own realms, though the 1992 WTO agreement makes for one economic platform of some kind. Worldwide minimum wage is not set by the US, for isntance, though a low minimum wage here may make it harder to increase minimum wages elsewhere.
At issue is the control that populations have over their governments and therefore over (inter)national businesses and labor issues such as paid leave and minimum wages. Five weeks vacation a year is not all that special in Europe; it's on the low side. Minimum wages are decent minimum wages.
The American low level of controlling businesses can reverberate throughout the world, but it does not set the standard. It is particularly with investments that giving more to the investors pulls money in. But that can only remain in place as long as the profits are not shared with all. Republicans and Democrats can do nothing about that because they are weak. Voters are weak in the US. The politicians do not have to listen much to the voters.
When Reagan and Thatcher embraced neo-libertarianism, the other nations had to follow that race to the bottom the best way possible. They were nevertheless able to still invest in their own infrastructure, schools, hospitals. But US and UK put pressures on others. I am hoping that brexit will enable the EU to go back to being more socialdemocratic again. That may take five years or so before that is obvious.
The US and UK have that limited form of freedom. The voters are weak. The parties in control are limited to 2 (the one coalition government in the UK in 2010 did not bring much change).
The pull down that US and UK have cannot be dismissed, but the pull can also not be made the same as dominant. Different standards (including much better standards) exist elsewhere in the world. There are nations in the world that are not dominated by cowboy capitalism.
