Hey @hb1. For a moment I thought you and @hr1 were the same person. LOL.
The problem is balancing future growth vs. retention of new members.
Like I said in the post, steemit is not actually able to keep up with the rate of new registrations. That's why it takes too long to get an account approved. Because it's being done manually. SO, I'm reasoning that removing the dollar sign won't really have a big effect on onboarding new users.