Out of order comment, because ... out of depth for reply.
It appears that you do not know what a power curve is, and so missed what I was talking about. A power curve is that swooping up thing. That graph in the white paper that shows the distribution of payouts. It is like y = x^2 from math class.
When a whale votes, they are not just adding their SP, they are making a guaranteed move to the top of the graph.
Basically, what we think of as a whale as having 1000x more voting power than a minnow, really equates to a whale having 1000 x 1000 (1,000,000x) more voting power.
Or 1000 minnows all getting together do not have the same voting power.
And, if the minnows don't feel they have any impact, they will just leave.
Which is the death of the steem.
But that has nothing to do with ROI or any potential investment and curation earnings for "minnows." That's just a problem of perception and expectations.
This is a problem with not understanding how the platform works. The users that sign up, see that their vote "doesn't do anything," then leave in frustration says nothing about the actual mechanics of the system. It's all about expectations, which need to be better managed.
Any "minnow" can make a small investment into their account and take advantage of curating. They can earn a good ROI if they learn the platform and put their capital to good use - just like any other investment. As I previously stated - I get three to four times (at least) the return that nearly every whale gets.
You wrote this above, which is what I initially responded to:
You're talking about potential ROI. With a larger investment in SP, you can get larger returns in SP. But the percentage that you get depends on how well you manage your investment. I'm able to get a current 25 - 30% annualized. I've currently been receiving 10 - 20 SP daily. Only the most active/influential "whales" might see returns of 200 - 400 SP daily, but their annualized return is typically lower than 10%. So, I'm actually gaining on them every day, all else being equal.
If new users took the time to learn the system and learn about these types of returns, they wouldn't be leaving in frustration. They would likely be trying to earn that relatively large ROI, compared to most other investments.