This is the drawback to encrypted currency.  Instead of having a bank take care of a lot of the administrative annoyances of the monetary system for you (long-term transaction records, sending and receiving your money, security), you get to bear a slice of the overhead directly yourself.  You are your own "mini-bank."  Personally, I'd rather have a FDIC-insured bank do it for free, enjoy the perks of interest, and enjoy the perks of zero transaction fees, and invest the hours of time and effort into making more money.  Bitcoin is a well-done concept, but it's by no means a medium of exchange and vessel of monetary storage, at least for the average competent businessman who knows time is money.

Here's what you get with a bank checking account and savings account in the USA through ING direct:
$0 in fees
Small amounts of interest (on $50,000 of deposits, you're going to earn $200-$400 per year in interest!  Currently yields are 0.8% APY)
Virtually zero resource load on your computer (running the online banking web portal is pretty undemanding)
FDIC insurance, the world's most powerful government and military guaranteeing $100,000 of my deposits! WooT.

Here's what you get with bitcoin:
Transaction fees on a per transaction basis (boo!)
No interest (super boo!)
Moderate resource load on your computer (downloading the blockchain requires a paid for internet service - fail), although in the long term the resource load will be insurmountable (100GB blockchain some day)
No insurance and nonexistent client-side security unless you spend money / time / effort properly securing your wallet (super duper boo).

Bitcoin has a way to go to beat banks, credit cards, and plain old cash.  For those of you who who are considering a non sequitor into evil fiat currency, buy S&P automatic index funds, trust me you're really bad at investing if you think btc is the way to go to beat usd.