I think the 32 ETH lockup + slashing does make it riskier to stake, but it also makes the chain more secure. As a malicious Ethereum staker, every failed attack costs me a lot of money. As a Cardano staker, I can attempt an attack many times because there I don't lost that much if it fails.
The lack of liquid staking is the only real drawback I see here, as it has allowed some centralization in the Lido token. Ethereum has yet to address that issue
Tbf, most money nowadays doesn't physically exist nowadays. Only a tiny fraction of the "money" that is out there has a physical instantiation. Most of it is just numbers in bank servers