I agree it is not easy to use correct local version, but that is why gradle wrapper is there. In case you do no trust it, you have workaround for it. For projects from company repository, this should not be issue. For random project from github, it may be worth to go the safe way.
Gradle: But at least we gave you a workaround. And this way we don't have to support backwards compatibility when we capriciously change our minds about something.
