I take the point about the payout threshold, but at the time the platform was suffering from spam and farming.
At present you need about 2000 HP to beat the threshold with a full vote. If you moved your STEEM over to HIVE and plugged away for a bit longer, you'd have 2000 HP.
Those with more have mostly bought some along the way - 2000 SP was achievable for a little over $200 at one point.
The system is set up so that the majority of content will lack votes and engagement, and at these 'low' prices that is even more apparent.
So far, I've not seen an alternative to match.