Daylight Saving Time started yesterday. So you lost an hour and might still feel a little groggy today. Now everyone’s asking the same question again: WHY are we still doing this?
It seems like every news outlet covers the debate twice a year. CNN, Fox News, the AP, and “The New York Times“ all have stories on it right now.
A poll last fall found only 25% of us want to keep switching the clocks twice a year. Everyone else wants to make Daylight Saving Time permanent, or ditch it altogether.
Over a dozen states have passed laws to make it permanent, and at least 28 more have bills in the works. But they can’t go into effect until the federal government says it’s okay, and that hasn’t happened yet.
The main argument AGAINST it seems to be we just don’t know what the effects would be. But of course, switching the clocks twice a year has an effect too.
For what it’s worth, we DID try permanent Daylight Saving Time once, and it didn’t go well. President Nixon did it for 16 months in 1974 and ’75. But people complained about their kids going to school in the dark. So we went back to the current system.
We also made another change not long ago. In 2007, Daylight Saving Time was extended by more than a month. It used to start the first Sunday in April and end in October. Now it runs from the second Sunday in March and ends in November.
