1. He handled it poorly, I think he could have just answered more directly and it wouldn't have looked bad.
2. I don't see why people are so upset about it. Obviously the reason they charge 1400 more is because when they put that price tag in Australia, australians still buy it. What happened to free market?
I've read that the best way to rewire your brain at an old age is to always learn new things. This keeps brain cell activity high and stimulates the creation of new synapsis
I think programming actually requires linguistic skills. When you program you are actually writing in a language, and you have to respect it's syntax and structure.
Therefore I don't think it should be compared with math. Unless you are writing a program for a very specific scientific problem that requires the elaboration of a mathematical model.
Usually the computer does all the math, all you need to do is type the operations you need it to calculate.
I'm not saying they're completely unrelated, I just think linguistic skills are more relevant in most cases
I don't think it's a bad thing that Google treats each employee differently.
There's no reason why contractors should have the same benefits as regular employees. Google is a business, not a charity. When Google gives engineers to-go boxes, they don't do it because they like them better than other employees, they do it because it's a competitive market out there, and they want to keep the best.
Besides, maybe letting contractors take food home is too expensive for the company. Maybe they couldn't afford free food at all if they give to EVERYONE.
If the security guard wants to earn more, he should either start a business on his own or improve his skills to get a better job.
People who make this argument tend to make it sound as if it were a discrimination issue, it's not. The reason engineers get paid better isn't because they're white, taller or prettier, it's because they're more prepared and thus add more value to the company.