The crust of the issue is no one is under any obligation ti hand out merits (except merits sources, to a small degree).
I never said anyone is, what I'm trying to convey here is the fact that I believe, it's my opinion I've painted in the OP and it's for the better of low rank members as well as the forum, because if such deserving members are not getting/going to get rewarded in terms of merit only, they'll still be seen as shit posters due to possessing low ranks with high activity number. And yeah, it's not gonna work out the way you said (as the whole responsibility isn't for merit sources alone, everyone here is given the privilege to use their power to help others - I think that's one more reason why merits we're introduced - to see if forum members have the courage to give their shoulder to work as a stair for low rank members to level up).
Merits help others to rank up, mostly everyone here is just to earn a side income, and for most of them, it's a living if they are in a signature campaign. Just to stop others from being promoted to higher ranks so as to reduce competition and keep it low (with the fear of losing their own position in that campaign as few may not be confident enough of their capabilities of remaining in the same), they try their best not to share their merits ahead.
If somebody is hoarding the sMerits due to fear of losing a position in sig campaign is stupid. For any btc campaign there is always more number of participant available then number of spots. If they are posting shit then they are not going to be included in campaign. Only solution is to make themselves a better poster.
With so many merit source, they can not stop any deserving poster so better to improve themselves instead of hoarding their sMerit
Once again, it was my opinion about what I feel may be one of the best fit reasons as to why one is hoarding their merits. I urge to those who get merits (whether newbies or higher) that they should also merit posts better than theirs (if they believe they've found something worth giving a merit but
low level members should help mostly low level members* in order to keep the merit contribution going and let the circulation be carried out in a continuous manner).
* - I personally think that low level members who get merited mostly should consider their category to be promoted with them hand-in-hand but that's my opinion and once again, no one is bound to think and do the same way.