The author said in a postscript that he was worried about seeming elitist. I didn't think it was elitist at all, and I completely understand why it was a good choice for him to write BASIC code.
However, I also did manual labour in the summer when I was ~20. There was nothing wrong with it. I would certainly recommend a brief stint of it to a young person, especially if you are training towards a sitting down/talking type job.
You are outdoors, you end the day physically tired but with mental and emotional energy for other things. You gain skills and improve your health and fitness. There's usually a good atmosphere among the workers. And you get to point at something concrete and say 'I helped put that up/knock that down/repair that'.
However, I also did manual labour in the summer when I was ~20. There was nothing wrong with it. I would certainly recommend a brief stint of it to a young person, especially if you are training towards a sitting down/talking type job.
You are outdoors, you end the day physically tired but with mental and emotional energy for other things. You gain skills and improve your health and fitness. There's usually a good atmosphere among the workers. And you get to point at something concrete and say 'I helped put that up/knock that down/repair that'.