You can have free markets without investments, which imo is the key differentiator between Capitalism and what came before. That’s what ‘capital’ is in capitalism.
In fact, capitalism tends to trend towards monopoly which is the opposite of a free market. Investing in a monopoly tends to be a Very Good Idea for investors but we want a free market so we go against the ideals of capitalism to break up firms and limit acquisitions.
Once you can invest and reliably make money invested by its very nature you get Rich-Get-Richer.
You can say this is a fine trade off for the benefits if you like, but it’s pretty well baked into the design. IMO we don’t have to go all the way to some other -ism either but we have a trillionaire that bought the government, that’s waaaayy too much capitalism if you ask me
