Dream job dry run… Depressed lawyers… Gaming boom

Dream job anyone?

Almost everyone wishes for a dream job. Most people are not living it. Here’s a United States company that gives you a chance to try out your dream business for a few days. Through Vocation Vacations you work – and you pay – for the privilege. But it gives you to opportunity to work out whether the business, or the job, is all that it is cracked up to be.

It’s a glorified type of work experience. You get to be a corporate filmmaker, bed and breakfast owner, forensic pathologist, restaurant critic, wedding coordinator and more. But hopefully, it is not as humbling an experience as work experience can be – you shouldn’t have to get coffees and pick up dry-cleaning.

Lawyers get depressed

Consider the fact that every time you call your lawyer, you have a problem. And you usually want it fixed very quickly. This is making a good proportion of them depressed.

In a landmark survey of 7500 professionals by Beaton Consulting for the national depression initiative beyondblue has found that lawyers are 50% more likely to suffer from depression than other professionals.

Why? Long hours, relentless pressure to meet billing targets, tight work deadlines and a fixation on detail. And lawyers, who are trained to consider worst-case scenarios and assess risk, tend to be pessimistic. The survey found that about 5% of lawyers are turning to drugs and alcohol to try to cope with their problems.

After lawyers (15% of whom report moderate or severe depressive symptoms), come patent attorneys, then insurance underwriters, accountants, IT services, architects, actuaries, engineers, consultants and insurance brokers. In total, 10% of respondents reported moderate or sever depressive symptoms.

Gaming booms

US sales of video games, devices and accessories rose 33% to $US1.1 billion in March, thanks to sales of new game consoles such as the Wii from Nintendo, according to figures from market research firm NPD.

The Wii was the No 1 current-generation video game console, selling 259,000 units. In the hand-held category, sales of the Nintendo DS hit 508,000 in March, ahead of Sony’s PlayStation Portable with 180,000. Overall, game sales were up 15% to $US574 million, according to The Australian Financial Review.