alt Hacker NewsYou’re very close to asking whether capitalism leads to the best quality of life, if you think of quality as going beyond the availability of products and services.
People who grew up in Soviet-era poverty of course see this differently than comfortable middle class people who feel alienated by soulless suburbia.
I think the article could be read as a way to reconcile the two.
Value creation not captured is the definition of a positive externality, and landlords being able to extract that value despite not creating them is an example of rent seeking. Aiming to address these does not somehow question capitalism.