[f. CAPITAL sb.2 + -IST.] One who has accumulated capital; one who has capital available for employment in financial or industrial enterprises. Also attrib.
1792. A. Young, Trav. France, 529. A gross evil of these direct imposts is, that of moneyed men, or capitalists, escaping all taxation: none but duties on consumption affect them.
1823. Coleridge, Table-t., 27 April. The poor-rates are the consideration paid by … capitalists for having labour at demand.
1845. Disraeli, Sybil (1863), 95. The capitalist flourishes, he amasses immense wealth; we sink, lower and lower; lower than the beasts of burthen.
1867. J. B. Kinnear, Quest. for Refd. Parlt., 213. The capitalist class.
