Update on transaction fees for those who may be concerned:

I sent a transaction 12 minutes ago with a 21 sat/byte fee ($0.35; recommended is currently 51 sat/byte) and it confirmed in the next block.

I think people in large pay humongous fees either because they are:

a. Roger Ver sending bitcoin to himself in a quest to prove that BTC has high fees
b. sent by people who don't mind sparing a couple extra bucks to guarantee a quick confirmation time

Long story short: there's no reason to pay more than $2 in fees when $0.35 will do just fine.