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Maybe we could afford for it to be a selling point years ago when transaction demand was very low and the block subsidy was very high. Cheap transactions didn't hurt miner incentives when block rewards were 50+ BTC. That's changing. In 5 years, the block subsidy will only be ~ 3 BTC. Shouldn't fee revenue be rising to compensate miners? How long can miners be expected to subsidize users with cheap fees?
I think Satoshi was naive with some of his economic assumptions.
I probably don't know enough about the subject, so please be patient with me.
I'm not defending Satoshi, but maybe he thought that BTC's rising value (it is deflationary by design after all) would offset the loss in mining revenue of the decreasing block rewards? I mean, I'd bet that 3 BTC 5 years from now would still be a lot more valuable than 50 BTC from a few years ago. I understand that mining costs are also increasing, but isn't that what the difficulty adjustment is for? It ensures that there will always be financial incentive for miners, regardless of transaction fee revenue.
I concede that transaction fees will have to rise, and that micro transactions won't be plausible at some point anymore (nor would it indicate failure). My concern is that it still has to be cheap enough as to not be detrimental to adoption. My views may be a little too naive though (like how Satoshi's may be lol), so I would appreciate any insight.
