java - Difference between EST and America/New_York time zones

Question

Can somebody please tell, what's the difference between the following two statements:

TimeZone.getTimeZone("America/New_York")

and

TimeZone.getTimeZone("EST")

In other words, why is EST different from America/New_York. Also in my application, to get the current time zone in US, should I use America/New_York or EST.

Answer 1

EST is UTC - 5 hours. America/New_York is EST in the winter and E*D*T in the summer, so right now New York is UTC - 4 hours.