It is indeed an important consideration. It creates a hole in people's budgets.
When the program was developed in 1940, one of the underlying principles was that no benefits would be paid out to unemployed workers for the first two weeks. In other words, it was the equivalent of a penalty. An added problem is the many administrative delays associated with the EI Commission. Often, people receive their first cheque covering their first week of unemployment 7 or 8 weeks after losing their job. There is no question that persons earning barely enough to scrape by and who cannot save enough to cover the two-week waiting period experience some hardship.
In our offices and in our groups, we hear countless horror stories. I won't get into the details at this time, because that is not why I'm here. In any event, the two-week waiting period and administrative delays are the cause of some serious hardship. The situation is unacceptable.