Do note that this was the maximum allowed size. Many blocks are under that, or even empty. It's completely up to the miner that mines the block. This is probably not something that can easily be changed.
The 1 MB maximum size was also true only up to August. New style transactions are allowed to go above that, and inputs and outputs are counted differently towards the limit in order to incentivize transaction defragmentation.
It's not relevant to speak of a fixed size cap anymore. If everyone changed transaction type overnight we'd see somewhere around 2 MB blocks, but it is expected that the rules would lead to a change in what transactions are made which would make blocks larger. Especially if things like Lightning transactions are more popular in the future.
> thus you need to pay $10 to secure a place for your transaction.
That's probably something like the average fee for the past few blocks, but the minimum fee you need to pay is much lower. The exact number is not very relevant however since Bitcoin fluctuates in value, and so does the transaction volume.
Note that fees are denominated in Bitcoin. Fees have actually been pretty stable over the long term, but the skyrocketing price of Bitcoin has lead to it not being practical for low-value USD transactions. This was always true, but the minimum value for which it is viable increases as Bitcoin is more valuable.