Frankly, it seems that most (nearly all) patents have only a trivial amount of money invested to create the idea, other than what the patent lawyer costs. For example, "playing checkers --- with a computer" patents. Ending all patents would not slow down innovation at all.
There is one exception, drug patenting, where billions are spent developing a drug and getting it approved.
So, you might say, only big business could afford to file patents. Not exactly, $1m is well within the reach of a startup.
But even for big business, they're not going to file 1000 patents at a cost of a billion dollars.
Patent trolling would become an untenable business plan.
https://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/microsoft-still...
Did you read this ?
> where billions are spent developing a drug and getting it approved
I do grant that the practice of patenting small incremental changes to existing patented things ("this drug, with slower release!") does seem a bit questionable, but overall it still seems like a good thing. I'd be interested in hearing your argument for why it's not a good fit.