Perhaps many buy and sell merit points in secret, I think it is very difficult to get merit points, most people will probably take a shortcut, maybe they have multiple accounts to send each other..
this system is new and most of the merits goes to meta posts.
people need more time to know about this system. maybe 1-3 months is enough time to know if this system good or bad.
we have total 600,000 smerits and 36 sources.
lets wait more time and Then we judge the system