I'd love to agree, but in practise this doesn't work - check the donation address on some of your favourite bitcoin software, almost every one I've ever checked has been 0.
It is surprising how many addresses I've checked and seen either zero or a few cents USD as the amount received.
That's why multibit started skimming transaction fees, haha.
Actually, there's an idea. Transaction fees or part of them anyway, going to the devs. Then if people actually are using the coin they get some money.
Another good idea.
Perhaps if it started as 50% of transaction fees, then halved each time the block halved such that miners gradually transitioned over to fees, and the developers away from fees.
The combination of that and the aforementioned % per block could work wonderfully together.