Given the relatively recent European experience (Nazis and Communists, among others) there is a reasonable argument for data privacy even if it hampers economic growth. However...

> If the rules are so terrible, why did nobody choose market exit?

Because major players don't particularly mind such rules; the public doesn't care about their data all that much and everything will tick on as usual with some nag banners and compliance officers.

The problem is the major players aren't going to be European because it is no longer legal for EU companies to get started by doing what the US companies did to get started. There is a reason the EU is backseat driving US software companies - EU industrial policy killed off the EU ones in the crib (to be fair that wasn't the GDPR, the GDPR is just part of the same anti-growth regulatory pattern). They died so young we've never really even learned what their names would have been.

EDIT I'll point at companies like Uber. It looked pretty illegal for most of its early years, until it could afford enough lobbyists to legalise its business model. Never would have worked in the EU.

>The problem is the major players aren't going to be European because it is no longer legal for EU companies to get started by doing what the US companies did to get started

essentially finding ways around the law and its spirit to screw people over and degrade the quality of life for the citizens to one's own benefit. Your edit pointing to Uber never working is pretty much making the case here.