In the past six years, 19 states have made efforts to move to year-round daylight saving time. So what’s in the way?
Just so you guys know, Mexico did away with DST last year. It’s been great not changing the clock twice a year.
Come on US… Stop dragging your feet.
I don’t care what the offset is. it’s just fucking numbers. if I’m getting up at something called four versus something called six it doesn’t make a difference to me. I just don’t want the numbers to CHANGE twice a year
I’m with you. Either that or make the day it changes a universal holiday. One or the other.
All I really care about personally in the “spring” ahead. It’s difficult for me to go to work with an hour less sleep. I have obligations that make it hard for me to go to bed earlier than I do.
Many people might not know. If your state wants to stop changing their clocks, they can do it right now. The problem is that a lot of vocal people want permanent DST which (literally) takes an act of congress.
I think SDT is the right way to go, but mainly I want the clocks to stop changing. If you want the time changes to stop, talk to your state legislators. Once the clocks stop changing, then we can convince our employers to allow shifting work hours.
Read an interesting article that said insurance companies lose tons of money because of time changes. Animals supposedly get used to traffic being low/high at certain times of day (based on the sun cause they don’t have watches). So when the time changes, they keep their same routine and end up causing more accidents while crossing roads they are used to being empty.
The week after we move clocks forward in the spring, thereby “losing an hour”, there is a marked increase in car collisions and heart attacks.
It’s kinda absurd if you think about it. We’re here arguing about Standard Time vs Daylight Saving Time while people are literally dying every year due to losing sleep every spring. I wish more states would just bypass Congress and revert back to Standard Time.
I know some think permanent standard time is best. But I respectfully disagree, for several reasons.
First, the argument for standard time is that we need the light in the morning to wake up. And, sure, that would be great. But with standard time, most people are already getting up in the dark. Sunrise only moves to 7am or later around here. A lot of people are already up earlier to get kids on buses (my bus went at 6:45) and to work starting between 7 and 8.
Meanwhile, look at what happens to evening light. Sunsets will go from 6 to 5, and many will travel home in the dark, or simply have no light when the get home, with hours to go before sleep.
The fact is, winter just doesn’t have enough light to go around. So we have to pick our poison. I’d rather get home with some light.
Second, no one considers what would happen in the summer. Here, sunrise would come at 5 am, too early and disruptive to sleep. If light would wake us up better in the winter, than it would wake us up too soon in the summer.
Third, people say we tried it in the 70s and everyone hated it. But when it happened, we didn’t just stay on daylight savings, we switched in the fall, and then back in January, an abrupt change in the darkest time of the year rather than the gradual change it should have been since fall.
And even then, many people lived it. There were people that didn’t, sure, but it is wrong to say it was universally hated.
But make we just need to compromise. Move the clocks 30 minutes and be done with it.
But make we just need to compromise. Move the clocks 30 minutes and be done with it.
I was with you until this. But that’s because I’m a programmer and time stuff is hard enough before you start using minutes instead of hours.
I think putting the sun’s zenith at 1pm would be better year round. Even with that my kids still wake up before dawn starting in October, and I’d rather have daylight when I’m awake.
I’d rather have light in the evening but I honestly just want to get rid of the changing.
The question is basically: do you want school and work to start earlier or later?
Why change the time for everyone when you can just adjust “working” hours. People who do shift work or work retail and other non- white-collar jobs are collateral damage. Roofers and farmers change their start and stop times baes on light and heat conditions.
Just start at a different time. Time is based (roughly) on the global position from a reference mark. Stop fucking with it.
This only works if everyone in the country starts and stops work/school at the exact same time which isn’t possible.
Local businesses and governments already shift their hours to be open when people are awake and available regardless of whatever arbitrary thing the clock says…
If DST and Standard Time are functionally equivalent for all intents and purposes, why not just stick with the simpler one?
On permanent dst sunrise in Boise would be at 9:20 during the first half of January.
It’d be like 9:50am here in the Netherlands and I still support permanent DST. The daytime is basically our employer’s time anyway, I’d rather not waste any more precious daylight on that part of the day. It really sucks getting off work and it’s already dark outside. Hard not to crash when it’s pitch black out by 5:30 pm.
The daytime is basically our employer’s time anyway, I’d rather not waste any more precious daylight on that part of the day.
I feel like this strikes at the heart of the whole DST vs. ST argument. As I mentioned in a sibling thread, it boils down to how much control we have over our own schedules. Instead of a mutualistic relationship, we’ve sold our souls to our employers. Shifting to permanent DST may be a temporary solution, but if we can’t figure out a way to form healthy relationships and boundaries with work/school/etc, even those gains will eventually get optimized away from us.
And sunrise would be 5am in June. And you ignore that sunset would be 6:20pm instead of 5:20.
The fact is, Boise gets just 9 hours of daylight. Pick your poison. I’d rather the light when I might be able to enjoy it.
I’d rather the light when I might be able to enjoy it.
There’s a subtext to every DST vs. ST argument that never gets talked about: how much control people have over their own schedules. If, instead of shifting your clock, you could instead shift your schedule, wouldn’t that achieve the same result?
In June on dst sunset is after 9:30pm. I don’t need it to be light at 10:00, it’s frankly annoying. I actually enjoy it being light when I drive to work in the morning.
The fact is, the US tried permanent dst in the 70s and everyone hated it. It’s why we took it back
I love how a purely factual statement somehow receives as many downvotes as it does upvotes … People are weird.
People arguing for our against really need to give their latitude. I’d imagine the further north you go, the more you are in favor of permanent dst.
I’m at 56°N. DST does exactly fuck all but mess with my sleep. I’d rather just stay at one time all fuckin year. In winter it doesn’t make a fuckin lick of difference if the sun rises at 8 or 9 or 10, it’s dark when I leave the house, and it’s dark well before I get back in.
I used to live at 49°N and that was actually worse.
41N.
And yes, this is true. But why should we be denied just because those closer to the tropics don’t have a problem? Or perhaps time zones should be rather diagonal so the the north can get later sunsets.
And those wanting standard time should also give their latitude. And rather or not someone is on the east or west end of the time zone makes a huge difference. Those further east in the time zone sees earlier sunrises and sunsets and are also more apt for daylight savings. For instance, much of New England would probably be better off in the Atlantic time zone. As it is under DST, the sun rises before 5am in Portland, ME, and EST would put sunrise before 4am! Sadly, being in the same time as certain business centers like New York and Boston (Maine wants to be the same time as Boston, and Boston the same as NYC) have made many bad time zone boundaries.
The opposite. For northern latitudes, the time switch is actually somewhat beneficial. People generally don’t love waking up and going to work/school/whatever in the pitch black. DST doesn’t magically “save daylight.” The total amount is daylight is the same for either.
The only real solution is permanent Standard Time. Local businesses and governments already shift their business hours as they see fit for other reasons, so keeping “summer hours” and “winter hours” is totally reasonable.
While we might not love going to work in pitch black, we don’t care to have all our evening in it, either. As you say, the total amount of daylight is the same, so we have to pick our poison. I’d rather have more light in the evening. I will hate the 5pm darkness that comes tomorrow.
Morning our schedules is no better than moving out clocks.
We’re kind of having the same argument in two different threads … I’m not sure which thread is better.
Morning our schedules is no better than moving out clocks.
It’s objectively better! “Moving clocks” is effectively the same as moving schedules for individuals, but to practically coordinate with others, everybody must change their clock and therefore their schedule. Individuals and organizations already construct their schedules as needed.
Part of the issue is that we all work too damn much, anyways. The 40 hour, 5 day work week (and thus the 9-to-5) is an arbitrary concept that research has indicated may be just as effective as a shorter work week.
I don’t mind dark mornings, since I’m already at work by 7am each day. But not being able to walk/bike in a park safely each afternoon, not being able to cook outside, or hang out with friends in the daylight is a bit sad. And also SAD as in the disorder since we are now inside during the only hours of daylight…
