Of course the loss will be real in that electricity costs money and miners might just turn off their rigs to save energy if transaction fees are not high enough. That is indeed a problem, but that same problem will also arise with the current bitcoin when no more coins can be mined. Actually that sounds like a real danger for today's bitcoin, since a lot of rigs will be turned off, leaving the network so much more vulnerable to the "51% attack".
This is why bitcoin should never be confused with an investment asset, commodity or even a collector's item. It's only a currency (a medium of exchange, or an accounting ledger, if you will). It can only exist if the number/volume of transactions is high enough to compensate miners for running their rigs. Hoarding bitcoin (either by miners or users) would only lead to its demise.
Measuring bitcoin in how many (or how much) fiat currencies it can buy is as useless as measuring it in how many bananas it can buy: at the end, it's all about whether the supply of those goods (services) is increasing or decreasing with time.
As for a solution (under my system) maybe miners could be promised some of their returns to be delivered in the future, at what ever the rate is at that time? Like, you will get 25% of what the rate is today right now, then you will get 25% of what the rate is next month, at next months rate, then you will get 25% in two months at that times rate and finally the last 25% in three months at whatever the rate is at that time. It will take some time to get all the coins (length of time can of course be adjusted and should be decided by the miners themselves).
Miners should realize they hold the key to bitcoin's success.
They are the central banks of bitcoin economy.
It's time they start acting like it.
Update:
For more, see
http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=29565.msg373207#msg373207