[jawher]

It's not just the SQL. There's also the mapping code between your objects and the SQL. for instance, for a select query:

    select first_name, last_name, login, email from users where id = 5;

Depending on the language and ORM you use, you'll need to write code that resembles this:

    result = execute(query);
    User u = new User();
    u.firstName = result.get("first_name);
    u.lastName = result.get("last_name);
    u.login = result.get("login);
    u.email = result.get("email);

The mapping part may also involve data conversion between SQL types and you language types.

The same also applies to the other direction: when you want to generate an SQL query that updates/inserts an object of yours into the database.

ORMs also handle (I didn't say well) relations between objects (1..1, 1..n, n..n).