If you google the subject, there’s actually a consensus (albeit a tentative one) that there are more slaves in the world today than at any time in the past. I don’t think most people have any idea of this.
And that’s going with a fairly restrictive definition of slavery. As governments grow more totalitarian and control an ever greater share of the economy, and control grows over people’s personal lives through censorship, educational indoctrination and surveillance, I think a fair case can be made that slavery is a general condition now of humanity.
I agree with you; especially about definitions and how slavery is structured to not meet the definitions. Like clever lawyers, classification of slavery can be covered up in methods, loopholes, and language. The essence is the same. Elites wish to make us all slaves in system that essentially is, but doesn’t meet the definition of slavery. It is no less than masked ownership of people who are trapped within the institutions of the system without any real power.