I have no idea what the point of this story was, but the heading was misleading enough to have made me read it in the first place. Isn't job satisfaction a universal desire held by all employees, whether full-time, part-time, casual, on-call etc? Governments can only make policies that respond to societal NEED, not everyone's individual WANTS. Your feeling of fulfillment in your whatever mode of employment you choose is your own problem to be solved. The budget addresses more practical matters - ie: the needs of the broader community.

Yes Rose, you're largely right - Jackie is talking about "wants". But politicians pander to perceived, acknowledged or tacit wants whenever it suits them, and sometimes in conflict to real needs anyway.

For instance, when they disregard the personal guts, determination and initiative of some people who want to become part of this country and whose attributes our society could well benefit from - in the name of pandering to the ignorant among us, who don't-want-people-like-that...

The distinction between needs and wants is not so clear cut, Rose, and sometimes it's only in the accompanying spin that an issue falls one way or the other.

Good luck Jackie. Don't let the churlish ones stop you realising your dreams. (And always follow up an emailed job app with a phone call!)

Send 'em back and don't come back. I'm not talking about refugees Fiona, I'm talking about people like you. I mean, it is obvious that you are alluding to refugees, but refugees is not what the article is about. Your comments belong to another article.

The article is about the pursuit of job satisfaction. Some people are grateful just to have a job, so Bailey should'nt be so picky!

Davo - a firm believer in mediocrity aren't you?

Jackie follow your dreams. We need more imaginative people.

However, don't expect politicians of either stripe to understand. They are limited to the lowest common denominator.

Good luck

Jackie at least got it right when she acknowledges the futility of looking to politicians to solve her problems. Seems silly to be looking there in the first place.

Work - life balance is not the concern of government. It's unbelievable that anyone should think it is. Now that Jackie's stopped looking to the government as a panacea for all ills I'm sure she's on the road to happiness. Live your dreams Jackie - you will definately regret it if you don't have a go. But please don't whine about it.

I have been lucky enough to work part-time for 13 years now, with interesting, well paid, highly skilled work to do, but despite acknowledged achievement, I have not progressed into management. This is mostly to do with the boundaries I draw around myself so I can do my work and parent my now teenage daughters.
However, that is my point. A work colleague (much more senior than I am, in terms of title) once said to me, rather wistfully, that I had a balanced life. "You know what a balanced life is, don't you?" I replied. She looked blank. "It means you don't get all of anything."
People want a balanced life, but they don't want to give anything up to get it, and you have to. No CEO (she is now a CEO) has a balanced life, but, then again, nor does a full time parent. Yet some choose to be a CEO - and why shouldn't they - and some choose to be full time parents. The rest of us muddle about, parenting less than we'd like to sometimes and working less than we'd like to, too. That's life, I guess.

Unfair attack on Fiona, we all want to be part of being a success. I don't think she was necessarily alluding to "refugees", rather, anyone that wants to make a go. I'm with Rose C on this one. Govt can't make me happy in myself, even it I agreed on all their policies. It is up to me to make me happy and my life well balanced. I'd dearly love a well paid, part time job - that I love - that could bankroll me to pursue my mosaics and scultping without having to a) write a dirty great big funding submission and b) juggle the rest of my life sans children. It isn't and shouldn't be govt bankrolling your choice of lifestyle. Most of us do muddle along and find our talents in time for us to be able to pursue them, but are no longer footloose and fancy free and happy to live on the oil rag of the dole.

At least you're only musing Jackie, rather than bitching. Keep going girl! And, every dream job I cried that i didn't get... lead me down a different garden path. By the way, not getting an interview by not getting the email, smacks like a bit of they had someone picked out anyway. Having interviewed and hired people, I would always take a late resume into account, unless I'd had someone else for the job. So don't feel too gutted.