I agree, it makes sense that people should have some stake in the game to get good curation votes.
However, more than half the Hive rewards each day are given out as either DHF projects, HBD interest and defending the HBD peg. The situation has blown so out of whack now that the DAO is nearly 50% of the Hive Market Cap and growing!! This would be the first thing to go after than someone getting a $10 upvote imo.
Fair point, I'm not too informed about the DHF projects and the HBD stuff but it's clear that value is taken away from Hive to keep the peg up one way or another which is another reason it's rather hard to invest in Hive.
The incentives are really badly skewed sadly with no change in sight. The price is the signal. If the HP holders weren't being plundered, the price would be much higher.