Why Hasn't the US Ended Daylight Saving Time? (yahoo.com) 290
In March the U.S. Senate passed a measure making Daylight Saving Time permanent.
Unfortunately, the U.S. House of Representatives has failed to do the same, reports the Washington Post: Key senators who backed permanent daylight saving time say they're mystified that their effort appears doomed, and frustrated that they will probably have to start over in the next Congress. At least 19 states in recent years have enacted laws or passed resolutions that would allow them to impose year-round daylight saving time — but only if Congress approves legislation to stop the nation's twice-per-year time changes, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures....
"We know that the majority of Americans do not want to keep switching the clocks back and forth," Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) said in a statement to The Post, adding that she had received calls arguing in favor of both sides. Permanent standard time advocates don't want children to wait in dark winter mornings for a school bus; permanent daylight saving time proponents want to help businesses enjoy more sunshine during operating hours, she said. A congressional aide who has been working on the issue put it more bluntly: "We'd be pissing off half the country no matter what," said the aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss internal deliberations....
Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) and other lawmakers have said they're waiting on the Transportation Department, which helps govern enforcement of time zones, to review the effects of permanently changing the clocks. While the transportation agency in September agreed to conduct a study, the due date for that analysis — Dec. 31, 2023 — suggests that the issue may not get serious consideration in Congress again until 2024 at the earliest.
Unfortunately, the U.S. House of Representatives has failed to do the same, reports the Washington Post: Key senators who backed permanent daylight saving time say they're mystified that their effort appears doomed, and frustrated that they will probably have to start over in the next Congress. At least 19 states in recent years have enacted laws or passed resolutions that would allow them to impose year-round daylight saving time — but only if Congress approves legislation to stop the nation's twice-per-year time changes, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures....
"We know that the majority of Americans do not want to keep switching the clocks back and forth," Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) said in a statement to The Post, adding that she had received calls arguing in favor of both sides. Permanent standard time advocates don't want children to wait in dark winter mornings for a school bus; permanent daylight saving time proponents want to help businesses enjoy more sunshine during operating hours, she said. A congressional aide who has been working on the issue put it more bluntly: "We'd be pissing off half the country no matter what," said the aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss internal deliberations....
Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) and other lawmakers have said they're waiting on the Transportation Department, which helps govern enforcement of time zones, to review the effects of permanently changing the clocks. While the transportation agency in September agreed to conduct a study, the due date for that analysis — Dec. 31, 2023 — suggests that the issue may not get serious consideration in Congress again until 2024 at the earliest.
Well that's simple (Score:5, Insightful)
Because it is a thing that we can all collectively complain about, while our 'leaders' are busy fucking up the country.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Seriously, just change your clock and STFU.
Re: (Score:2)
Yep. Enjoy a couple more days a year where something interesting happens...
Re: (Score:3)
It won't change anything. If you time zones that are roughly one hour wide, some in the world are multiple hours wide, then someone will be in darkness at before others are in their zone and vice versa. The problem is trying to synchronize some artificial construct such as "work starts at 8am, it's lunch at 12pm, and you can go home at 5pm" to the cycles of the sun and earth.
Better to have universal time everywhere rather than try to create wide zones that try to mimic local solar time.
Re: (Score:2)
Because we enjoy suddenly driving home in the dark. (starting tomorrow)
And since everyone wakes up at 5am, it makes sense to put more daylight in the morning.
Especially if you are a farmer 200 years ago, it makes sense.
Re: (Score:2)
Because we enjoy suddenly driving home in the dark. (starting tomorrow)
Better than going to work in the dark, when everybody is still half asleep.
Re: Well that's simple (Score:2)
Re: Well that's simple (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3)
sounds like communism
Re: (Score:2)
Because there are still kids who walk to school in the morning? Many schools start at 8am, which could mean a kid starts walking at 7:30 or earlier, which would've been getting dark any day now if we stuck with DST. These schools let out in the afternoon, so evening light isn't a danger.
And the bodies dead children blocking the road will snarl traffic and ruin your commute, so you don't want that.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Do you have kids, and send them walking at 7:30? In the winter? Perhaps people did that in in 1975 ??
Most schools start at 8:30. Most kids are driven to school.
There would be no dead bodies of children.
Re: Well that's simple (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah... at this point it seems to exist just to give bloggers and social media outlets something to complain about twice a year.
Mismamed (Score:5, Insightful)
Should be called daylight shifting.
Also what's the point of having a time system based on the position of the sun then ignore that? Wouldn't it be simpler for society to shift from 9 to 5 to 8 to 4 in summer instead of buggering about with the clocks?
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
The funny thing is that, if you tell people to get up an hour earlier, they'll go "no way, I'm an evening person, I don't want to get up so early". But if you tell them you'll change the clock so they have more daylight in the evening, their reply is an enthousiastic "yeah, great, because I'm an evening person". People are stupid.
We should just use standard time. If someone wants to have "more daylight", nothing keeps them from getting up an hour earlier and going to bed an hour earlier (which is what DST d
Re: (Score:2)
We should just use standard time. If someone wants to have "more daylight", nothing keeps them from getting up an hour earlier and going to bed an hour earlier (which is what DST does). The reverse isn't true, we can't just decide to get up an hour later and be late for work or school.
The correct thing to do would be to put it in the middle. Change it by half an hour.
But:
a) Nobody would be able to gloat about "winning"
b) Nothing needs to be done, the system isn't broken.
Besides: What the hell's wrong with having two more interesting days per year? Break the routine once in a while.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Besides: What the hell's wrong with having two more interesting days per year? Break the routine once in a while.
That's actually a really interesting way of looking at it - we just need to find a way to suit both the thrill seekers who want the excitement of time changes and those who prefer stability.
A compromise along these lines would be to switch clocks by 12 hours twice each year so noon becomes midnight and midnight becomes noon. For those who want the excitement of changing time patterns, they can 'opt in' by using a 24 hour clock display and get a much more radical change than at present. Nevermind 'more light
Re: Mismamed (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Another solution would be to make the definition of the second slightly longer so that it makes a difference of one hour over a whole year, and then set the clocks back by one hour once every year.
Yes - another great compromise. Though I do wonder if we could change the definition of a second further so it's dependent on the time of year and both gradually eliminates the hour for the first six months and then gradually adds it back over the next six months.
Those who don't want to change their clocks won't have to change their clocks, those that want to get up earlier in the summer while pretending it's the same time as in the winter get to do that, the developers who have to code for it get an intere
Re: (Score:3)
Besides: What the hell's wrong with having two more interesting days per year?
All of the deaths.
Re: Mismamed (Score:2)
The above will be the best post in this discussion.
Re: (Score:2)
Morning person or not does not matter. People can adjust to whatever time convention. That should be evident if you ever travel or move to another place in the world.
The question is where we want the most daylight? For humans, the obvious answer should be that we want more daylight while we are awake.
When is your "sleep midnight"?
Waking hours 6am-10pm: sleep midnight: 2am, awake midday: 2pm
Waking hours 7am-11pm: sleep midnight: 3am, awake midday: 3pm
Waking hours 8am-12am: sleep midnight: 4am, awake midday
Re: Mismamed (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
you can see that those American / European politicians can't even conceive of arranging an ending of timezone shifting and a beginning of office hour / school hour shifting on the same day. So of course it is stuck.
The procedure or proposal of ending timezone shifting should have been: Let's stop messing with the clock for "daylight saving" or "summer time". Let's put the timetable change explicit and keep the clock as is. Give companies and schools back their freedom of whether and how much they want to
Re: (Score:2)
Should be called daylight shifting.
Also what's the point of having a time system based on the position of the sun then ignore that? Wouldn't it be simpler for society to shift from 9 to 5 to 8 to 4 in summer instead of buggering about with the clocks?
Pretty much this.
I'm pretty certain that the permanent daylight savings time people don't have much of a concept that going to permanent DST will not save daylight.
Here in the northeast, the main effect will be to make a large part of the year, people will get up and drive to work in the dark, and leave work and drive home in the dark.
Re: Mismamed (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
50 years ago you worked 9-5 and the company paid you for lunch. But then companies wanted to open earlier needed two shifts of employees to insure coverage. That became expernsive so they slowly started increasinghours eorked for the same base pay. Now on average a person works 9 hours with 1 30 minute and 2 15 minute "break's but of course actually taking breaks and sick time most compabies is actively frowned upon workers jave to work the full 9 hours get paid for 8 and not xomplain about it.
The reaso
Re: Mismamed (Score:2)
Re: Mismamed (Score:2)
Why Hasn't the US Ended Daylight Saving Time? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why Hasn't the US Ended Daylight Saving Time?
Well, as a somebody who isn't a US citizen and has spent decades watching the US with the scientific interest of the legendary David Attenborough monitoring the activities of a colony of meerkats, I'd say it's because the USA has the most ingenious political system ever conceived by the mind of man. It consists of two parties that hate each other's guts. Both have about enough loyal following in elections to scrape out about 48% of what you need to gain a congressional majority. Who wins elections thus depends on the flip-flopping of a small number of so called 'swing-voters'. When one of these two parties proposes something, even if it is extremely sensible, the other party feels it is its patriotic duty to oppose that measure at every step out of pure sectarian spite. It also doesn't help that the president of the USA has powers that effectively make him a modern version of a medieval king. All of this combines to mean that in order to get anything done, like abolish daylight savings time, you either need a veto proof majority in both houses of congress or a trifecta with enough of a majority in both houses of congress to (a) override a presidential veto and (b) allow you to ignore your own party's lunatic fringe. Unfortunately both parties are to varying degrees increasingly corrupt and/or suffer from 'growing lunatic fringe syndrome'. Of course followers of either party will tell you this only applies to the 'others' and that their own side is the very definition of god given morality, wisdom and human virtue. Personally I think they are both full of s***.
Re: (Score:3)
A fairly good summary of the US political system. It generally reminds me of living in a really bad neighborhood where you get to choose which of the two rival gangs fighting over the turf gets to fleece you. Unfortunately, not getting fleeced is not an option.
Re:Why Hasn't the US Ended Daylight Saving Time? (Score:5, Insightful)
A fairly good summary of the US political system. It generally reminds me of living in a really bad neighborhood where you get to choose which of the two rival gangs fighting over the turf gets to fleece you. Unfortunately, not getting fleeced is not an option.
True, I was always rather fond of this quote by Frank Herbert in his novel Dune:
“In politics, the tripod is he most unstable of all structures. It's be bad enough without the complication of a feudal trade culture which turns its back on most science.”
However, I think he was wrong. In politics a bipod is even less stable than a tripod.
Americas R's and D's have two choices. They can either stop acting like a bunch of toddlers and (a) rediscover the lost art of compromise or (b) they will preside over the loss of America's dominant world position to China because they were too busy sectarian feuding to bother with their international rivals. A dive into the history of the Byzantine empire is a good example if one wants to know where the current state of affairs in the US leads. The US as a country is in a bad place if whether to keep or ditch daylight savings time becomes a sectarian issue (disclaimer: I genuinely hope the US hasn't sunk that low).
Re: (Score:2)
They can either stop acting like a bunch of toddlers and (a) rediscover the lost art of compromise
If they do that, they will lose the next election. There is no constituency for compromise.
I vote for gridlock, which is the opposite of compromise.
(b) they will preside over the loss of America's dominant world position to China
One area of partisan agreement is abandoning trade agreements and surrendering America's economic leadership. "Compromise" is leading us in the wrong direction.
Re: (Score:3)
I think that the reason why the factions are so focused on petty squabbles is because so many people have to vote "for the lesser evil" so the parties do not have to be good, just better than the other non good option in many enough peoples' minds.
That is the problem of the first past the post system, in a proportional representation system where voting on a smaller party is not throwing away the vote and no one party can rule by itself, the parties have to step up their game.
Of course it does not always wo
Re:Why Hasn't the US Ended Daylight Saving Time? (Score:5, Insightful)
I used to grow up in a time when party slogans were "vote for us, this is what we'll do so your life gets better!"
Today, the slogan is "vote for us, because this is what they will do and your life gets worse".
You don't even have to promise people anything anymore. They already know that your promises are empty, so they don't work. All that's left is fearmongering that the other crook is even worse.
Re: (Score:2)
The two parties need each other so they can pretend towards their patsies that every one of their blunders is the other party's fault.
That's why the communist states failed. There wasn't another party to shift the blame to when you fucked up the country.
Re:Why Hasn't the US Ended Daylight Saving Time? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's why the communist states failed. There wasn't another party to shift the blame to when you fucked up the country.
Communism has only survived in North Korea and Cuba, where American embargoes give them someone to blame for their failures.
Re: Why Hasn't the US Ended Daylight Saving Time? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
> It also doesn't help that the president of the USA has powers that effectively make him a modern version of a medieval king
Either you're greatly overestimating how powerful the POTUS is, or I've been lied to about how powerful medieval kings were...
The entire system was designed to hedge against such accumulation of power, 'cause you know we had just finished fighting a war against a king so we wouldn't have to deal with that bullshit anymore, y'know? Having it difficult to do things is on purpose, an
Re: (Score:3)
I think he's talking about Executive Orders, and in that aspect he's correct, they shouldn't exist and are now used by Presidents to basically legislate which is supposed to be the power of Congress.
Re: (Score:3)
While you're probably right about EOs needing to be erased from existence, GP's rather astute observations about the eternal partisan/sectarian gridlock in Congress and the resultant legislative paralysis of that body means they're oftentimes the only practical way to get anything done.
Of course, whatever doesn't get overturned by the Courts usually gets rescinded the next time a Shia president takes over from a Sunni, sorry I mean Republican/Dem, so they're not even very effective at legislating.
God, I can
Re: (Score:2)
That's not really an issue with EO's but still an issue with Congress. Congress could legistlate away really almost any EO if they wanted to, they just don't.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't think you understand what EOs are. They could use some tweaking, but elimination is all but impossible.
The Legislative Branch (Congress) says "do things". It is up to the Executive to do them. However, Congress frequently leaves a lot of the details up to the discretion of the Executive on how to actually get things done. The President uses EOs to do things Congress already told him to do -- or gave enough leeway to permit it if the Executive so saw fit.
The problem is things like "secret" EOs that a
Re: (Score:2)
Back in the mid 1980s the state I live in adopted permanent Daylight Savings Time. It lasted less than a year. As soon as winter came, everyone started complaining that their kids had to go to school in the dark, and they went back to the current practice of changing twice a year.
Re: (Score:2)
History keeps repeating. Back in the mid 1980s the state I live in adopted permanent Daylight Savings Time. It lasted less than a year. As soon as winter came, everyone started complaining that their kids had to go to school in the dark, and they went back to the current practice of changing twice a year.
And here you have it!
The vast majority of people believe that Daylight savings time just creates more daylight. If anyone wants proof, this whole discussion serves. DST was created for a reason, it's not like our honorable ancestors got baked on fine Kush one day and decided "Let's do the dumbest thing ever as a stunt, and no one will be able to figure out why we did it! Now pass me the goddamned Fritos, wouldya?"
Yes, if we go permanent DST, the sun will rise pretty darn late in the winter in the tempe
Re: (Score:2)
>"It consists of two parties that hate each other's guts. Both have about enough loyal following in elections to scrape out about 48% of what you need to gain a congressional majority. Who wins elections thus depends on the flip-flopping of a small number of so called 'swing-voters"
All of it is easily fixed by some type of ranked-choice voting system, at least at the primary level, if not all levels of voting. With RCV, most of the spoiler effect is removed, and we are no longer stuck with an entrenched
Re: (Score:2)
I have this hope as well, but Maine has moved to RCV and they are still effectively a two party state. 3rd parties have gotten a little more traction, but they're still not making it into office for the most part. Yes, nice that the independent can get 10% of the first round vote, but in the 2nd round they get 0% and those votes go to the two major parties.
Re: (Score:3)
>"I have this hope as well, but Maine has moved to RCV and they are still effectively a two party state. 3rd parties have gotten a little more traction, but they're still not making it into office for the most part."
That's OK, it will take time for it to start working (for new/good challengers to run, for the public to grasp the concepts, etc). Plus, it immediately puts great pressure on the two-parties to pay attention to all the voters and not just depend on their "base" or a single issue. So even if
Re:Why Hasn't the US Ended Daylight Saving Time? (Score:5, Informative)
I think you overestimate party loyalty. A fair chunk of votes a party receives (or at least one of the parties), is not because people are loyal to them, but because they find the actions of the other abhorrent. First-past-the-post voting in gerrymandered districts with systematic voter disenfranchisement means we get predictably shit "representation."
Re: (Score:2)
Re: Why Hasn't the US Ended Daylight Saving Time? (Score:2)
No longer the lunatic fringe (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Only the lunatics of party B think that, so you've outted yourself nicely as one of them.
Re: (Score:2)
Ending DST is a bad idea (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
You might want to name those horrible consequences, because frankly, I could think of worse consequences than the sun rising and setting.
Re:Ending DST is a bad idea (Score:5, Informative)
It makes sense to sleep longer in the mornings in Winter. It fits our circadian rhythm. Our sleep cycle is longer during winter compared with the summer.
The problem with continuous time during the whole year is that it doesn't fit our rhythm in the summer and neither our rhythm in the winter. All you will get is more tired people. That's why I predict that in 10 years time after abolishing the shifting of the clock, people will pressure to get it reinstated. It has happened before, and it will happen again. In 1974, continuous daylight saving time was already enacted in the U.S., but it was reverted the year after, because it just didn't work.
But as they say: People not learning from history are doomed to repeat it.
Re: (Score:3)
You will get more traffic accidents in the mornings, because people aren't really awake yet.
That's what coffee is for. Or go to bed earlier.
Children can't play outside in the morning,
They don't play outside in the morning now as it is. They stare at their phones.
won't like to walk to school
Except for a select few communities, kids don't walk to school. They ride a bus.
the morning hours in offices will be unproductive
What office? People are working from home. Are you saying these people aren't productive
Re:Ending DST is a bad idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Yep. A coworker tried this with me just the other day. "Well my kids will have to go to school in the dark!"
I asked her what that had to do with my clock, and she was confused. It took a couple tries to get her to understand that the decisions of her school board shouldn't be impacting the lives of everyone who doesn't have kids in those schools.
If it's too dark, wait until later to start. This is not a difficult concept. If your school/work/church is starting at a less than ideal time for you, ask them to change. If enough people do, they will.
Or find other options that work better for you. I don't go to my favorite pub on Saturday afternoons anymore because they decided they wouldn't open until 5pm. I didn't ask the fucking world to change their clocks so I can get a 4pm beer at my pub.
Re:Ending DST is a bad idea (Score:4, Insightful)
I have a great idea to counter this. Stop messing with the clock and use normal time the whole year.
Yes, if you push the clock forward an hour relative to the normal time, it's gonna be dark during Winter mornings. Who'd have thought?
What it doesn't fit is profit motives. (Score:2)
Biology and all other concerns are secondary to our Lord and Savior Greenback Christ. This will not change as long as money = "free speech" because "corporations are people" and lobbyists are some how not bribery and thus legal. Instead we get Rome w/ churros and mattress sales.
Re: (Score:2)
Wouldn't you just be time-shifting those accidents to the evening because now you have people tired from working and driving at home in the dark?
EU (Score:3, Insightful)
Forget about that, I wonder Why Hasn't the EU Ended Daylight Saving Time? The European Parliament voted for it in 2019 and then everybody forgot about it and shifted attention to COVID and war in Ukraine.
Re: EU (Score:3)
I'm amazed that the EU hasn't started investigations of timepiece makers to understand their full involvement in the matter and started threatening fines against them if they don't stop interfering with the natural order of time.
because they are stuck in the past (Score:2)
Follow the money (Score:5, Funny)
Big Sunscreen.
Wake up, sheeple.
Re: (Score:2)
I always figured that it was the companies that sold the automatic time-changing "atomic" clocks that kept DST going. If you never had to spring forward or fall back, that feature becomes a lot less useful and you don't have an excuse to charge an extra $25 for that feature anymore.
Server time coordination (Score:2)
How many PST servers are set to America/Los_Angeles? Some installers no longer give an easy option for other locales. Adoption will have to be widely coordinated.
Re: (Score:2)
How many PST servers are set to America/Los_Angeles? Some installers no longer give an easy option for other locales.
If your OS isn't getting updates, which include DST updates, then guess what? You're the problem.
because the people donâ(TM)t want to. (Score:2)
Re:because the people don't want to. (Score:5, Insightful)
Arizona and Hawaii already opted themselves out of DST. This is something a state can choose to do now. Instead 19 states voted to all year DST, which is something they need approval from their non-function along congress to do.
States can accept/reject DST any time they want. There's nothing stopping them.
But politicians are cowards by nature. So, 19 states have adopted a resolution for permanent DST, but *ONLY* if congress passes similar legislation first. Because *APPEARING* to do something is far more important than *ACTUALLY* doing something. And, if there are any complaints, the local polticians can just blame it on congress.
Same in Europe... (Score:5, Insightful)
...we where supposed to switch last year but nooo...
It's so stupid and totally unscientific to keep "adjusting" our clocks for the "daylight", oh yeah - lets invent a fake time machine and adjust the clock because - light!
Bring sanity back, time is time - don't touch it.
Can we compromise? (Score:2)
tragedy of the comm^H^Hpolitics (Score:3)
Because they're afraid to piss off half the country, they'd rather do nothing and keep the status quo - which pisses off 99% of the country.
Duh! (Score:2)
The US still hasn't saved enough daylight, obviously.
Think of the children, in the dark (Score:2)
Afaik that's been the excuse that always gets brought up.
Re: (Score:3)
Here's a weird idea: Start schools later during Winter.
Because DST all the time is stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
If anything we should go standard time all the time - so noon is actually noon-ish at least some places. This means you have at least some ability to tell time via sol, and things like sun dials (which you can't adjust for DST) work.
All other arguments are just dumb - If you want more light in the morning make the local convention to open business at 9a rather than 8, or if you want light in the evening go 7-4p instead. Setting the clocks such that noon is never actually even close to the sun being directly overhead is - DUMB
Re: (Score:2)
"If you want more light in the morning make the local convention to open business at 9a rather than 8"
That is the problem, all business, and schools, and would just need to open earlier and close latter, at some point. This would be really expensive and also confusing for everyone, unless they all agreed to do it to the same extent at the same day. And then we just have Daylight savings time, but more confusing.
Indoor businesses can just have everyone drive to work in the dark, and increase traffic deaths,
Re: (Score:3)
Not really - It would be pretty easy for the local city council or school board or whatever to shift their schedule "On or After Halloween" each year.
Pretty much every business is going to follow along - suburbs and counties will probably mostly end up tracking the nearest big city. - It will all work just fine!
It isnt as if various business don't already open at any odd hour between 8-10 you already pretty much have to look. Also regional conventions will almost certainly take hold. You probably see pret
Re: (Score:3)
so noon is actually noon-ish at least some places.
Why?
This means you have at least some ability to tell time via sol
But what's the point? Time is free and common knowledge. Nearly every human is within earshot of many sources that tell them the time without ever having to look up at the sun.
and things like sun dials (which you can't adjust for DST) work
If this was 1379 I'd agree with you, but it's not, it's 2022 and the only sundials we have in service are nothing more than pointless garden ornaments or historical monuments which precisely zero people use to actually tell the time.
All other arguments are just dumb
The no true argument fallacy, no your points are just as dumb and unfounded offering no benefit as
Re: (Score:3)
Why should we care that noon is actually noon-ish? That's not exactly an important objective, given that the numbers on the clock dial are completely artificially assigned. There is nothing magical about needing to have the "12" at high noon. Why is it 24 hours anyway, instead of 10ths of a day, like the metric system? Who cares, it's just a manmade concept.
Calling other people's opinions "dumb"...is kind of dumb.
Re: (Score:2)
You are A/C - The 17th amendment has done more to reduce our politics to banal popularity contests between demigods than anything else.
Having state legislatures chose experienced people to act as national policies makers was far more sensible, especially when the people already have a direct representative in the House.
If we're going to get rid of DST... (Score:3)
Why not just get rid of time zones all together and have everyone use UTC?
Re: (Score:3)
So you want to abolish time zones [qntm.org].
Health effects of DST year around (Score:4, Informative)
They already wait in the dark (Score:5, Informative)
Permanent standard time advocates don't want children to wait in dark winter mornings for a school bus
Just a note that kids already do this. My kids had to wait for buses at 6:30, 6:45 ...
That's a stupid school board thing, not a time system thing.
Stop making stupid decisions... (Score:5, Interesting)
1) Eliminate DST completely.
2) Have your local businesses and schools open and close based on whatever time works for them. There is no law that says schools have to open at 7AM. Have the local school open an hour later.
In a sane country ... (Score:2)
But .. here every group wants the whole world to adjust to their preferred times...
Because of retail establishments (Score:2)
There's all sorts of petty little reasons our lives are worse like that. Back in my old town the fast food restaurants blocked the building of a highway bypass for years because they wanted to force commuters to drive through the main city and passed there restaurants. And of course big pharma has been lobbying hard against legal weed and psychedelics for ages
Re: (Score:3)
There's all sorts of petty little reasons our lives are worse like that. Back in my old town the fast food restaurants blocked the building of a highway bypass for years because they wanted to force commuters to drive through the main city and passed there restaurants.
Yeah, they did that in Willits, CA. "Don't bypass Willits!" Well, if people want to bypass your town, maybe it sucks and you should make it nicer. Some businesses' traffic suffered a little, some suffered a lot, depending on whether they deserved business in the first place or not. Willits still sucks to drive through, but it's a hell of a lot better now that they built the bypass. I usually didn't stop there anyway because they didn't have enough parking, which they haven't fixed.
because we apparently need something to complain a (Score:2)
Twice a year, every year.
Something for all the "well, actually..." people to complain about around this time because it's such a terrible thing they forget about it the other 50 weeks a year.
"Well actually people die because of it..." yes, about the same number as are killed by plunger accidents. Nobody actually cares. See you in 6 months.
Tried it once lasted less than one year (Score:2)
When first adopted there was wide spread approval and support for it. Before the next winter there was wide spread disapproval and it was repealed.
Also DST began as a SUMMER time thing, but now begins in late winter and continues until late fall. That is almost eight months of the year. The last time the dates were changed was in 2007 and I am not sure any
Re: (Score:3)
Actually, more than once. We also stayed on DST from February 1942 through September 1945 to save energy during WW2 [spectrumlocalnews.com]. It was so unpopular that time that Congress actually managed to get together and override a presidential veto [time.com] to be done with it. We have a bad habit of forgetting lessons.
One of the most telling facts about the 1973 experience is that the vote in the House in 1974 to return to standard time 4 months out of the year [nytimes.com] was 383 to 14!
If we're going to go to not changing time back and forth, the
Notice the irony? (Score:2)
Anyone else find it funny that the headline talks about eliminating DST while the very first line of the article talks about making it permanent?
And that's the problem in a nutshell, as the fine summary points out. There's absolutely no consensus on what to do other than we don't like what we have.
Why we can't stop changing to DST and back: easy (Score:3, Interesting)
We can't stop changing from DST and back to standard time, because setting a single standard time splits the voters between just going to real standard time and just going to always lying about the time with permanent DST. Even if a majority wanted to stop changing official time, they can't form a majority on which way to do it.
Even trying a compromise and making DST only 1/2 hour difference, fails because figuring the 1/2 hour difference, is just too complicated getting appointment times correct, with the amount of easy travel that is available today.
My personal preference is to just keep with standard official time, and suggest schools and business just change their summer hours as they feel like. Probably there, individual initiative might be best with making a compromise 1/2 difference.
Darn, I just want to know that noon is when the sun is as high in the sky as it can go -- well plus or minus only 1/2 hour in any given "time zone". I don't care what businesses or institutions set as their start of work and end of work hours. Just work a 7 hour day if necessary -- that's good enough for all of us. And let the few over-achievers work 16 hour shifts as much as they want too, if they want to be blind to the real meaning of life.
Wrong Direction (Score:3)
Making DST permanent is the opposite of what needs to be done. DST needs to be eliminated. Just stick with Standard Time.
Re: (Score:2)
Permanent standard time advocates don't want child
top tip, change school open time
I tried to read this and now I smell burnt toast
Re: (Score:2)
What exactly is this supposed to show or prove?