Someone was writing an article about how Americans ignored the suffering of the homeless around them, and declared the entire country was sociopathic. I think it's more that Capitalism pushes the cost of profit onto others, and tries to remove those costs from our vision (putting pollution-generating plants in low income neighborhoods, paying third-world workers ridiculously low wages, etc.). On some level, we KNOW we don't deserve all the benefits we've accrued simply by virtue of being born in the right place, so we try to self-justify that we deserve them, and all the people who pay the costs don't. It's never been a viable long-term strategy (consider all the Colonial empires of Europe), but it's great for those on top in the short-term, until the people you're oppressing have finally had enough.