fzero: I know people who work for google as contractors - they are paid VERY WELL. This constant insistence that google contractors are being paid $30K to do w

fzero: I know people who work for google as contractors - they are paid VERY WELL. This constant insistence that google contractors are being paid $30K to do work that $171K engineers are doing in the same geo area is totally false. That does not happen. I am open to a specific example, but I'm not aware of one. To be a google contractor you need a contract that has google's name on it (or Google LLC etc). That is the literal definition of being a google contractor. You get a 1099 from google. If this describes you - you are, on average, paid well. Google flies on US airlines with highly paid and unionized pilots - I don't think they care. Are you confusing google contractors with employees of a large non-google business?