Certainly some important points you have brought up through your post, the main purpose of education is not to get degree or get a job and the only purpose of posting in forum is not to get merit. Don't just post to earn merit, post to learn something and keep reading other's posts only then you will learn about Cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin. If you don't have a complete understanding of cryptocurrency then what will you do to increase your id rank.
If a member makes an informative post then I don't think he needs to worry about his merit, if it is an informative post and if some other member learns something new through that post then that member must give him merit.
If earning only merit is the main objective then no we will not earn merit we will not know about anything our post quality will be good. So spend time on the forum to learn something yourself and try to inform others about something new.