The reason why you feel this way is because there is a large difference between value† as defined by markets (which I'm writing with a dagger †) and value as defined by everyone else (which I'm writing without a dagger). Value† is weighted by wealth. Value is not. Feeding a starving African village generates value, but feeding a starving African village does not generate value†, because the village has no money. Figuring out how to monopolize the telecom industry generates value†, because it benefits heavily-weighted interests while only penalizing lightly-weighted interests, but it does not generate value.
Markets promote value† creation, but they don't promote value creation, except insofar as the two concepts coincide. It is instructive to think about the circumstances under which the two concepts coincide, the extent to which those circumstances hold, and the extent to which we are moving towards or away from those circumstances.
For what it's worth, I use "makes money" for creating value†, and "creates value" for the common sense.
For those interested in the topic, I've found the Lean Manufacturing literature helpful. They're usefully obsessed with creating customer value, meaning doing or making something valuable for their customer. Which has some of the problems you mentioned, in that traditional commerce mainly serves people in proportion to the money they have. But you can pretty easily extend the Lean approach to value to non-commercial situations.
Markets promote value† creation, but they don't promote value creation, except insofar as the two concepts coincide. It is instructive to think about the circumstances under which the two concepts coincide, the extent to which those circumstances hold, and the extent to which we are moving towards or away from those circumstances.