On the other hand, at least in the US, we don't have much protection when banks themselves take money from our accounts. E.g. back in 2009, banks made $37 billion from overdraft fees [1], thanks to shady practices like reordering transactions to maximize overdrafts. There was a class action suit about it, but it was a token victory, with very little money going back to the victims.

This doesn't negate your point, but I would just argue that we pay a heavy price for our heavily regulated financial system, between bank fees, card processing fees, foreign transaction fees, trading fees, etc.

[1] https://www.npr.org/2012/02/28/147573947/the-fight-over-over...

Exchanges are not cryptocurrency.

From a financial exchange and price setting perspective, they are absolutely key to how the current cryptocurrency market works.

if Binance, Kraken, Bitfinex, Coinbase et al shut down tomorrow, what do you think would happen to the price of BTC and the rest...