If the trash pickup people stop doing their job for two weeks you'd be throwing a fucking tantrum. Same for the janitors who keep your office spaces and bathrooms clean. (And that's before the various illnesses start to spread all over your city from the build up of pathogens.)
The people responsible keeping our spaces clean (and thus, mostly disease-free) should both be paid more AND thanked more.
Garbage service is one of the ten deadliest jobs in the United States.
And police work isn't even on that list.
It should be self evident that garbage collection needs to pay more because it's nasty as hell, not to mention tough on the body. Ask yourself how much money you would want to pick up garbage. A lot, right? I know I don't even have the physical endurance to wake up at ass o'clock in the morning and go sling around garbage bags all day, much less the intestinal fortitude to deal with the smells and such.
Garbage collection does pay more than other jobs not requiring certifications in many places, for just this reason, but unfortunately that principle hasn't been extended to other physically taxing jobs with nasty aspects. Anyone doing any type of cleaning work should be paid a ton of money and they generally aren't. If you've ever found a public toilet in an unusable state you know what I mean. Even people who enjoy cleaning are having a bad time with that and they should be compensated accordingly.
