Yep, this is pretty much how I feel the week after a time change.
Well, it’s that time of year when we all run around like proverbial chickens with their heads cut off, moving our clocks back and suffering from jet lag for about a week. Daylight Saving Time is a crime. It imposes an economic burden, increases accidents and just plain irritates quite a few people.
According to a post on the “Huffpost Healthy Living” page, “the semi-annual time change might be costing the American economy as much as $434 million, according to a new index based on past research on heart attack incidence (published in the “New England Journal of Medicine”), workplace injury in mining and construction (published in the “Journal of Applied Psychology”) and cyberloafing (published in the “Journal of Applied Psychology”) all with regard to daylight saving time.
“Researchers noted that the actual financial toll may even be higher, because the index did not include impacts on car accidents or injuries in other fields (like transportation or manufacturing). A past study in the New England Journal of Medicine showed an association between loss of sleep from DST and an increased car accident risk.”
Daylight Saving Time was set up during World War I to give workers and particularly farmers more light in the evening to work by. Electricity was not widespread, particularly in rural areas, so the practice had some value. With the advent of near-universal electric power, DST simply isn’t necessary any more. An argument in its favor is that it gives workers more daylight in which to have picnics, play golf or sit outside, but I wonder if the cost of $1.4 million for every man, woman and child to suffer jet lag, endure an untoward economic burden and increase their chances of dying in an automobile accident is worth it. I don’t think it is, and it’s time to change. Write your member of Congress and keep writing until we have this thing beat. Give us back sun time and a better life.
Biscuit City 