I think both options are not worth it. We can get merit if our posts are in good quality, it is hard to get merit but it's not impossible to get it. The flaws of merit system should be corrected. It's a quite big amount for me to buy merit then suddenly you will get banned because of this.
Yes you are right there are some flaws in the merit system, for the admin side they should think first of their system before implementing it and to the users side since this was implemented atleast don't be corrupted if you have merits to give because I think it is being selfish.