Well, the idea of "public waking up" is pretty optimistic and I doubt that will happen. And if they "wake up" and demand a different financial system, there's a very good chance it will be worse than what we have now. I would never trust "the public" to come up with a financial system.
Maybe for now. But this is a one-thousand-year issue. It's highly complex, so you never know, and you can't expect progress immediately.
The best way forward is not for the public to design a financial system. It's to acknowledge that no one knows enough and can be trusted to design such a system, so the state must not get involved.
The first step to such an understanding is to know that today's system is not just sub-optimal, it's downright dangerous, and not far from evil, because of the perverse incentives it provides to the top elites and their professional mouthpieces in the media and academia.
I don't think it is true that the current system incentivizes to pursue profit. At least in my country it is very much the opposite, there are very strong incentives for not working/pursuing profit. All these government welfare programs with dozens of different payments that a person may be eligible for. And if you do even little work at the side, you lose them. But it's perfect system for the government, as those people picking up a check from the government are guaranteed to vote in a way which keeps those checks coming.
Also, the current system is not geared for economic growth. The elites want to stop/hinder economic growth. So they manufacture all these fake "social" and "environmental" reasons why we shouldn't have economic growth because "it's bad for the planet". The latest such scam is the idea of "global warming", but that is just one among many.
I'm glad you bring this up. This is just part of how the system works. The farther from the top of the imperial pecking order, the more dysfunctional a country's system. In the Third World, the elites print money outright to fund their constituents' benefits directly. All of this creates trust and demand for the paper issued by the top imperial powers. Savings flow up the pecking order, and economic pain flows down.
In effect if not by intent, this is an alliance among the elites in all countries. All elites benefit -- near the top of the system, the elites benefit from issuing trusted money and debt. Near the bottom, the elites benefit directly from the obvious corruption. The periodic economic problems flowing from the top keeps these populations poor and ignorant, and keeps these elites in power. In the middle, you have a mix of both.