I didn't have to answer any hackneyed technical questions or take any tests to get a job. The most technical thing I did was explain how a data structure I wrote works, which came up naturally in a conversation about what kind of programming I have done.

If you can demonstrate that you understand programming concepts and can learn, then it's not much more to assume you can write code. If you need someone who can hit the ground running with some specific technology, then you might need to go deep into it, but not to find out if someone can program.

Google does not hire people by simply assuming the candidate can code. You do not get the benefit of the doubt, and in fact, you must prove otherwise. They want to see you write code on the whiteboard and solve the technical challenge given.

And as we all plainly know: what Google does is what we all should do. That's probably the one company that's never done something unnecessary or wasteful.

Me and my colleagues never asked this trivial question when interviewing for Amazon, just like you don't ask a driver what a brake is.

I assumed OP was referring to white board coding questions when he said "trivial programming task", which Amazon indeed does ask you to do throughout the interview process.