I understand why we have Daylight Savings Time (DST) in the US and clearly see its benefits. (I lived in Japan where there is no DST, and with the midsummer sunrise around 4:30 AM and sunset around 7 PM, there’s a whole lot of wasted daylight.) What I don’t understand is why we keep starting DST earlier and earlier in the US.
When I was younger (in the 70s), we observed DST from the last Sunday in April to the first Sunday in October. Then, for a while, we started DST on the first weekend in April and ended it on the last weekend in October. A few years ago, we changed to the current scenario, which has us set to “spring forward” this weekend on March 10. We won’t “fall back” until November 3. Does anyone know why DST in the US is starting earlier and ending later than it used to? What is the benefit of starting DST so early?
(This thread stems from my grumbling when I realized that, after we change the clocks this weekend, my local sunrise on Monday will be close to 7:30 AM. There’s something unnatural to me about waking up for school/work in the dark. It’ll be a few weeks before we see the sun before 7 AM. If my ire rises high enough, I will head to The Pit.)
No it was changed by one week for Halloween. The other three weeks were added in the spring. Right now it is about equally spaced relative to the equinoxes. It starts one to two weeks before and ends one to two weeks after.
Personally I like DST and applaud Congress and Bush for the change. That’s not something I often do.
I like the later end to DST, but it really does start too early now. I have to get up when it’s still dark, and I hate doing that. I wish they’d left the spring start date alone, or maybe moved it one week earlier, rather than three.
You can’t shop after the sun goes down? What kind of reverse vampire society are you guys creating?
I get it; it’s for safety reasons, blah, blah, blah…
Personally I like the earlier spring start, but wish they would have left the fall alone. Trick or Treating is supposed to be done in the dark! Bwahahahaha…
It should be much lighter in the morning at the beginning of DST than the end. It currently starts the second Sunday in March. That’s the 8th through the 14th or 13 to 7 days before the usual equinox. It the fall it ends the first Sunday in November. That’s the 1st through the 7th or 41 to 47 days after the equinox.
This year for New York Sunrise is at 7:15 the first day of DST and is 7:28 the last day of DST. Of course, If your at the western edge of a time zone, YMMV.
(And NB I made a mistake in my previous post forgetting the fall equinox was 9/21 not 10/21.)
We tried it (more or less) in the mid 1970s (Wikipedia link; see third paragraph), due to the first energy crisis. People decided they didn’t like sending kids to school in the dark in the wintertime (among other issues); in the northern states, it meant that the sun wouldn’t be up until 8 a.m. or later. That’s a big reason why we haven’t done it again since.
Safety? Shopping? Energy savings? I’ve heard all these reasons at one time or another, but I don’t entirely understand them.
For safety, isn’t there generally a spike in traffic accidents the week after any time change? For energy savings (and I remember briefly going to year-round DST during the mid-70s energy crisis), how much energy do we save from DST? I know we turn our lights on later, but isn’t this offset by early morning energy use?
I’m not sure what the reasoning is. But apparently store get a lot more walk-in business when the Sun is out. You’d have to ask store owners why that is.
Not if you’re still asleep. Most people aren’t up before 6:30 am, so any daylight before then is wasted. DST attempts to keep the daylight hours coinciding with our awake hours as much as possible.
But all DST does is essentially force everyone to go to bed an hour earlier (sun time) and then get up an hour earlier. You can do that any time you want without forcing the rest of the country to do the same. I think it’s silly. Especially silly when different states and countries go on/off DST on different dates, if they have DST at all.
I think the whole DST is dysfunctional. Having grown up without DST and then moving to somewhere with it I found the whole thing simply amusing and ridiculous. That is until I had kids. Now I hate it with a passion. Young kids don’t understand why you’re waking them up or putting them to bed at different times than their internal clocks are used to. Preschool was at 8:10 - guess what - it is now at 7:10 for you ha ha ha.