Nineteen states have passed laws or resolutions in the past five years to make daylight saving time permanent if Congress — and, in some cases, other states — allow the change. Two states, Arizona and Hawaii, have long followed permanent standard time, which the law already allows. In standard time, noon arrives when the sun hangs highest in the sky. Daylight saving time shifts the clock forward, moving sunset one hour later. Currently, most of the United States operates on daylight saving time between March and November and standard time the rest of the year. The nation will say goodbye to daylight saving time on Sunday, at least for now. Scientists consider standard time to be the natural environment for the planet and the human body. Most sleep experts prefer it over daylight saving time for health reasons. “What standard time does is it optimizes our light in the morning,” said Beth Malow, a professor of neurology and pediatrics at Vanderbilt University. “And we really need light in the morning to wake us up, to get us going, to reset our whole internal clock with what’s going on in the world around us.” Public opinion on racing schedules has been confused over the decades. In recent years, however, two trends have emerged: People are tired of changing their clocks, and most Americans prefer daylight saving time. A Monmouth University poll in March found that 61 percent of respondents favored abandoning the time change. A YouGov poll that month found 64 per cent of respondents favored a year-round backdrop. A 2021 poll by YouGov and The Economist found 63 percent support for a single environment. All three polls show that the public prefers daylight saving time over standard time.
“We can go out after work and exercise. We can go shopping or have dinner at night when it’s not dark,” said Cathy Kipp, a Democratic state representative in Colorado, where the Legislature approved a switch to permanent daylight saving time this year, contingent on federal approval. “People want light after they get off work. They don’t want darkness at both ends of their day.” The public associates daylight saving time with daylight — and summer vacations, backyard barbecues, sunshine and warmth. “I think the reason a lot of people like daylight saving time is because they like summer,” said Jennifer Martin, president of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine.
Bucking the trend in state legislation, the Senate passed a bill in the spring that would make daylight saving time the new permanent setting. The Sunshine Act of 2021 would effectively put clocks forward one hour for good in every state but two. Arizona and Hawaii will be allowed to continue after regular time year round.
The bill prevailed in a process called unanimous consent, which bypassed the normal routine of testimony and debate. Some senators later quipped that his swift passage immobilized them. After the Senate vote, the summer movement hit a wall in the House. With the stakes rising, constituents and lobbyists flooded lawmakers with messages on both sides of the big debate of the year. Malow, the Vanderbilt sleep scientist, testified against him. Lawmakers are hesitant. Clouds of indecision have fallen over the Sun Protection Act. After months of delay, observers do not expect a decisive vote anytime soon.
For now, it looks like the big reset will continue.
“We know that the majority of Americans do not want to keep turning the clocks back and forth,” Rep. Jan Schakowsky, the Illinois Democrat who chairs the House subcommittee where the bill has stalled, said in a statement. “I have received calls from constituents who prefer permanent daylight saving time because they have safety concerns for children who have to wait long periods of time in the dark during the winter for the school bus, and I have heard from constituents and businesses who prefer permanent daylight saving time. they prefer longer hours of the day. While there doesn’t appear to be a consensus yet, I continue to listen to my constituents and work with my colleagues to determine the best path forward.” A congressional aide put it more bluntly. “We know that 7 out of 10 Americans want it to happen,” he said. “We just don’t know what to do. This is an issue where half the country will be upset no matter what.” The aide spoke on condition of anonymity because he is working on the bill and is not authorized to discuss it.
Local legislatures and pollsters appear to favor daylight saving time across much of the country. States that have permanently adopted daylight saving time — if Congress allows it — include the northern border states of Maine, Minnesota, Montana and Washington, where daylight is short in the winter. The stakes in any clock change are higher in the north, where even a one-hour shift can mean starting school or commuting to work in a “Blade Runner” darkness. The sun will rise at 8:26 AM. on Christmas morning in Bismarck, ND, one of the northernmost cities in the nation. If Daylight Saving Time were on all year round, Christmas would dawn at 9:26.
“We are not made to start the day in the dark,” Martin said.
Winter daylight is short in Minnesota, too. However, the state legislature enacted permanent daylight saving time in 2021, subject to federal approval.
“My view is that there may be more people who prefer the extra hour of sunlight in the evening that daylight saving time provides,” said Mike Freiberg, a Democrat who sponsored the bill in the state House.
But Freiberg is no fanatical zealot. He previously pushed for year-round standard time in Minnesota.
“Honestly, I don’t have a strong opinion one way or the other,” he said. “I just want to get rid of the clock changes.”
He is not alone. Jeff Bridges, a Democratic senator in Colorado, has sponsored bills to put his state on permanent daylight saving time. The DST bill survived. “Personally, I just want the madness to end,” Bridges said.
Year-round daylight saving time may work better in some places than others. Under today’s backdrop, sunrise never comes until much after 7 a.m. in the middle of winter in the Schakowsky area of ​​the Chicago area, near the eastern edge of the Central Time Zone. Benton Harbor is just 100 miles away, across the Michigan border. However, by the crude calculation of local time, sunrise arrives there about an hour later, in the Eastern time zone. Daylight Savings Time year-round would push sunrise to 9:14 AM. of January.
“We can’t stretch the day. That’s the problem,” said Ali Güler, an associate professor of biology at the University of Virginia.
Some sleep experts, including Guler, would rather see the nation united in year-round sleep than endure disruptive seasonal changes.
Tiffany Cross says ‘abrupt’ cancellation of show surprised ‘a lot of us’ Cheney backs vulnerable Democrat Spanberger in re-election bid “The change is horrible,” he said. “You can really count the devastation it takes every year,” a tally of heart attacks and car accidents in the hazy days after the violent spring.
But Güler would strongly prefer permanent standard time. Other experts, including Martin, favor “as much standard time as possible,” even if that means continuing with the semiannual clock change. “I read a great quote somewhere,” Martin said: “Light in the morning is for our health. The light at night is for our enjoyment.”