Georgia considers time change
Published 6:09 pm Wednesday, March 3, 2021
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
The Georgia Senate passed a bill last week that would end Daylight Savings Time in our state. It’s not the first time it’s been discussed — actually we published a story on March 3 of last year about the exact same subject.
The argument for the bill is that the change in time impacts our bodies in a negative way, causing health problems and creating problems that otherwise might not exist. Many farmers are also in favor of staying with the same time all year long.
Obviously, the argument for the bill is that Daylight Savings Time allows people who work a normal schedule the opportunity for some sunlight once they get off work.
We see both sides. People hate the time change that occurs twice a year. Springing forward and falling back isn’t only annoying either, it’s also bad for our health.
Health experts say the change in time can lead to more heart attacks, strokes and raises the risk of the potential for fatal accidents.
But it’s twice a year, and it happens on a weekend.
We realize people work on weekends, but most of the population is off on Sunday mornings. That doesn’t mean you can sleep in, but surely, most of us could go to bed an hour early to make up the difference.
We’ll also add that while we understand the thought process, we think it’d make more sense for Georgia to be on Daylight Savings Time year-round, rather than standard time. Most people — not all — enjoy the extra sunshine that’s available in the evenings during DST.
It’s getting dark now around 6 p.m. If we changed for DST year-round, it’d be dark at 7 p.m. right now.
We’d rather have that discussion than one focused around standard time year-round.
We’re not saying that’s the answer either, but we think it’d make more sense. One final change and then more sunshine — more hours of daylight — throughout the year.
That’s oversimplifying it, and we realize there are plenty of opinions and real reasons why that might not be best as well.
But we’re not sure going to standard time all year is the best option either.