I experienced something similar at a previous job. It was funny. I was working in a satellite office for an org based in a different country, and once in a while (minimum once a year) we'd be sent to HQ for a few weeks. Wrapping up projects, team coordination, whatever. So of course we'd eat together.

The team got a new manager when I joined, and he was told that our treatment was equal despite satellite office status because we were on the same teams coordinating on the same projects, but in different timezones.

Anyway, even though I was technically a FTE at the company, I didn't have the necessary prerequisites to pay for cafeteria food at FTE discounts. I was forced to pay contractor prices. A full extra $5 per meal. My manager was initially confused, then upset. Then we tried to talk with the cafeteria contracting company. They told him it was out of their control. So, we began investigating...eventually uncovering some internal "separate but equal" undocumented employment scheme were compensation, benefits, whatnot, unraveled into a weird caste discrimination system. The people that were pulling their weight were paid pennies while senior team members who were awaiting retirement just raked in the big bucks with benefits on contracts no longer offered, or offered through some backdoor deals before the company really expanded.

In the end, the lunch situation was solved by just stating that I was a FTE because I had the same color badge. It turns out the cashiers didn't even scan badges or anything, just asked you if you were internal and to show your badge.

But out of all the bullshit we uncovered, the food situation really broke his spirit the most.

This is like Intel with the apples and tea bags that green badges had to pay for.

I don't get it. Why would you be pissed if those were the rules of the company you were contracting to? As a contractor you get paid more than the regular employees because you take on a greater risk (such as being fired at any moment without any explanation) and you do whatever you're told. If you don't like it you can always look for another client. My point being you can't have your cake and eat it too. Does it suck sometimes? Yes. But such is contractor life.

> Why would you be pissed if those were the rules of the company you were contracting to?

Not being on the Google health or retirement plan is one thing. That's something you can do maths to, see if your alternative arrangements make sense.

But witholding food is something that feels anti-human. Like it hits some primal parts of me. Eating a meal with people you work alongside is, depending on your interpretation, between a few hundred thousand and a few hundred million years old as a social act.

Denying that is... something else.

Maybe they are people and not a robot, emotionally the context of a human is day-to-day not the lines of a contract.

Also most of the time these people are not receiving more money, more like the same or less.

Hospitality is a fundamental virtue. Skimping out on food is maybe the fundamental transgression of norms. The anger is subconscious and maybe primal.

I was a "contractor" from an in practice body shop consult agency, not an actual contractor. I did every day office work for three years, being part of a normal work group going to every day meetings etc.

But I don't think that matters. If you have an actual consultant in the office, being there once a month, you give him strawberries too, if you hand out strawberries.

Also, the pay was somewhat lower. I was fresh out of uni so I didn't know better.

Notably, only bosses two layers up thought it was a good idea to skimp on the strawberries etc. The bosses that had to deal with the ensuing bad mood ensured there was no such distinction between FTEs and "contractors".

I think we're talking about different things: contractors are paid more than regular employees doing the same thing. And they don't have any benefits the actual employees have.

> Also, the pay was somewhat lower. I was fresh out of uni so I didn't know better.

What you describe is outsourcing, not contracting.

The body shop and their client call it contracting. If one will follow the mantra of "words mean whatever people use them as" then this is contracting.

I doubt there are true contractors. Giants would not bother to do contractor paperwork with individuals. Most common is when "contractors" are employees of other bodyshop company and are paid as their regular employees, just leased to the client. And if the we are talking about US - then their salary is much lower, simply because they cannot go anywhere else due to visa constraints.