transaction fees for ethereum have always been like this because ethereum is a broken altcoin with a lot of bugs. a couple of months ago it went up as high as $2.5 and nobody cared because everyone including the whales controlling the price are on centralized exchanges like poloniex and are manipulating the price there. they don't even make a translation in their whole lives apart from cashing out the bitcoin profit or USD profit they gain from pumping it.

it will die in long run though. you can't have an altcoin like this and survive while other platforms like Waves exist and have no issue like this.