Journalism is not a hard job. In 2005 and 2006 I worked as a care assistant with intellectually disabled and behaviourally challenged adults in a number of residential units. That was a hard job. Journalism, politics, running a bank – these are easy careers and don't let anybody tell you otherwise.

I learned a lot in my time as a care-worker that had, up until that point in my life, evaded me. I learned the best way to lift people in and out of baths and beds and how to make porridge for a big group of people. I learned that bodily excretions and adult nappies were really no big deal, but an inability to express pain or anguish was a very big deal indeed (I learned this from watching troubled clients with limited language skills tie themselves up in unexpressible emotional knots). I learned that although I was at work, I was also in somebody else's home and I needed to respect that. I learned how to park a people-carrier while someone unexpectedly pulled my hair. I learned how to duck when one lady threw her shoes at my head. I also learned to grudgingly share her joy when she hit me with them.

I learned to respect Donegal crooner Daniel O'Donnell after seeing how much happiness one of his CDs gave to one intellectually disabled fan (although I also came to hate every single song on it thanks to constant repetition). I learned not to be embarrassed when two of the only words known by the very lovely, but very vocal, young man I was out walking with were "fuck off". Oh, and I really liked when we got to go on the bouncy castle in the gym.

For nine months, my job required me to be constantly moving, constantly caring and constantly alert. It was often rewarding (there's nothing quite like the way I was welcomed to work in the morning), but it was also physically and emotionally draining. After one difficult 12-hour shift, I left the unit with bright red scratches down the left hand side of my face and faeces in my hair, and I knew that I couldn't do it for much longer (in contrast, plenty of amazing people have the strength of character to make a career of it). Even at the time I was comforted by the fact I had a weekend off. The unpaid carers of disabled relatives or friends don't get that luxury.

The decision to cut budgets which has resulted in the axing of respite care for those with intellectual difficulties shouldn't have been considered by any government with a heart. While this batch of legislators are planning to go off for a substantial and well-paid summer break, one of their parting shots is to deprive overworked people who save the state millions every year of the only break they ever get.

It all comes back to what we value in society. Why do we expect people who look after the children, elderly and vulnerable to do so for little or no reward, while other people misfile paper and misread the markets in return for massive pay?

There's a whole branch of economics dedicated to remuneration. Within it there are all sorts of clever justifications for why some jobs pay so little (or in the case of those looking after loved ones, nothing at all) while others pay so much. The caring professions are "vocational"; the arts are, apparently, such a pleasure in themselves that practitioners will do it for near nothing; and those working at the coal face of manufacturing or retail must compete to keep their jobs, at whatever lowly paid rate the market dictates.

In contrast, the managerial class (whether corporate executives, politicians or high-level civil servants) are 'stars'. Despite the recent evidence suggesting that paying vast salaries is no insurance against incompetence, the 'star' theory of remuneration continues to argue that a competent executive/politician/high-level civil servant is as unique a talent as a Beyoncé or a David Beckham, and therefore should be paid a fortune.

This reasoning is ridiculous, given all our political and corporate betters have done for two decades is sheepishly follow the business cycle (and lest anyone feels like leaping to the defence of "enterprise", there's nothing entrepreneurial about juggling the capital of others with no real risk to yourself). These people need to recover their sense of vocation. They are overvalued. Meanwhile, all those incredible siblings, parents and children spending every waking hour looking after vulnerable people who would otherwise fall into the care of the state are chronically undervalued.

We need to readjust how we view all this. Last week, parents and families protested at the cutbacks in respite care outside the King's Island Community Centre in Limerick during a visit from the Taoiseach, and others staged a protest outside the Dáil (which was filled last week with people arguing over wildlife). A second Dáil protest against cuts in disability services is planned this Wednesday by Inclusion Ireland.

Another way of changing the political will would be to insist that each politician take one week of their generous holidays and spend it as a full-time care-giver. That might change their perspective on what is and isn't an acceptable form of belt-tightening.

Then again, I'm not sure I'd trust them with such a difficult job.

pfreyne@tribune.ie

Una Mullally is on leave