My personal opinions...
I don't use Hawk unless I'm in an instance or fighting elites. Otherwise I'm in Cheetah or Monkey if I'm forced to melee.
As a Troll I have berserking, which will not only increases my ranged attack speed but also my melee attack speed. On top of that Rapid Fire. So I don't really feel like Hawk is necessary to spec into unless it's for raiding and I want the passive benefit.
There has never been a *single* moment for me where I was like "hmm if hawk would of proc'd there I wouldn't have died".
If there's an "oh shit" moment happening...it's generally me being forced into melee range and when that happens...neither talents helps you at all, and they both just feel like filler. And if you're in melee range for whatever reason...you need to be in Monkey...so you're not even using Hawk.
Where the extra pet health has helped me is with my ability to solo elites. I know it doesn't seem like a big deal...but ultimately this is why I choose to spec into the pet health. For example I solo'd Rock'Alim (that elite in Thousand Needles) at level 31. My pet died but I was able to down the elite *just* after that, and I was never forced into melee.
If you're good at pet management...you can send your pet to attack any adds and pull the aggro with Growl, allowing you get back into ranged while your pet can take a few extra hits.
It would have made alot more sense for Blizzard to put Improved Aspect of the Money in the first tier, seeing as that's the first aspect you get. I bet you'd see ALOT more Hunters running that 5/5 to open up tier 2.