Good suggestion, thanks for sharing.
Answers:
1) Yes there is, funny, I made a small module for it. Gonna release it since it seem I'm not the only one needing this. Hang on, I'l post here when it's ready.

2) This is the nature of Ubercart stock levels. I personally like it the way it is.

is that using the simple stock levels?
No, it's based on the core stock module. Maybe it works with simple stock too, don't know.