People shouldn't stop giving merits in here but they should stop meriting merit beggars who come in here to either whine at merit or fake 'agree' that it's a great system in the hope that they get one (which a lot of time they have been even though you know they're probably crying with rage behind the keyboard but are just smart enough to know that complaining won't be as effective).
For me , it will better disable signature from meta(imo). So it will reduce spam post. But I don't think it will happen. Regarding handover merit, it's depends on merit source and high rank member's. They should concentrent others board as you said. There is quality post but need spend time to find. Obviously few members are trying to change posting behaviour. We should also need to welcome new member's. After implement new merit system I am trying to spend merit few new quality poster instead of send merit to high ranks.
Disabling signatures in this sub board isn't going to stop them fishing for merits here. Most of them are Newbies who can't even have a signature until they get a merit and that's why they post here looking for them, but there are worse boards for sig spam. Why aren't you making the case that we remove signatures from Bitcoin Discussion since that's the sub board with the most spam and has been ruined the most? Removing signatures from there would surely resolve that?