Pallas, if I send coins to the coinbase address then the coinbase balance increases and the reward for the block increases?
Nobody ever tried it, but I think it would work as you are suggesting.
I tried and I succeeded, balance the public key 0 (coinbase) increased, it's funny, you can burn the coins to redistribute their descendants
Yes, it's a side effect of the coinbase account I never though of :-)
It may be considered a feature by itself, and we could even play a bit of marketing on it...
Could you ask btc38 to send any of those "excess" coins to the coinbase account to keep them off market?