The characteristic of a capitalist economy is private ownership of businesses and means of production. It depends on free market for income prices and distribution of goods. while a socialist economy is characterised by government intervention for allocating the resources among its populations, prices are determined by the government.
Most of the countries today are mixed economies in which features of both capitalist and socialist economies are utilised as pure free market economies are prone to slowdowns, such a slowdown started in October 1929 in US. After that US government started to intervene in economic activities to achieve social aims. Mixed economies maintain private ownership and control of the means of production under government regulation, some industries are also under government control to produce public goods.
