House passes bill to enact year-round Daylight Saving Time across the country

ppseudolus about 2 hours ago 30 commentsRead Article on cnn.com

DE version is available. Content is displayed in original English for accuracy.

⚡ Community Insights

Discussion Sentiment

56% Positive

Analyzed from 1208 words in the discussion.

Discussion (30 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews

al_borland•about 1 hour ago

I think saying on one time is better than switching back and forth, but we should really stick to Standard time.

I know people like it to be light out later in the evenings, but they tried this before in the 1970s and it didn't last long[0]. It turns out not only do people not like it to be dark late into the morning, but it also makes it unsafe for kids going to school.

Looking at sunrise and sunset times[1], people will spend a significant portion of the year with dark mornings.

Historically, year-round DST was done to conserve energy during war time and other energy crunches. Standard time seems like the more balanced choice for year-round use... that's probably why it was the standard to begin with. As difficult as these things are to pass, and as disruptive as they are (especially now with software update requirements), getting it right instead of making the same mistakes of the past seems important.

[0] https://washingtonian.com/2022/03/15/the-us-tried-permanent-...

[1] https://savestandardtime.com/maps/

garciansmith•18 minutes ago

I mostly just want the time change to end, but I definitely prefer DST since the afternoon sun is something everyone can enjoy in the winter. I don't get how dark mornings (when a non-trivial percentage of the population is just asleep anyhow) are worse than a dark afternoon, especially when you'll probably wake up in the dark regardless. Plus sunrise even earlier in the summer is useless.

Kids already go to school in the dark in the winter (at least where I'm from). I can see how in the 70's it was more of an issue to increase the number of dark days because many more kids walked to school than they do now (another poster noted it's 10% of children compared to 50%, not sure if that's correct). And DST would be better for afternoon commutes. Plus DST has been pushed to being used during more and more of the year: the spring switch was in late April in the 70s and early 80s, then early April in the late 80s, now early March (since 2007 I think). 75% of the year is DST, let's just make it 100%.

But hey, the morning people out there are never going to be pleased with year-round DST, just like how people like me will never like standard time. But either is better than what we have right now.

slowin•19 minutes ago

Start school and work later, "problem" solved. Also another great argument for WFH, don't waste an hour in commute, spend it in bed getting the rest you need!

saulpw•36 minutes ago

I hate to say it, but you're the problem. One time is better than switching, but we switch because no matter which time standard we choose, some group of people takes issue. The only way we can get one time standard is if we all let go of our highest preference and allow the second-best thing to succeed. Otherwise we'll be doomed to third-best (devolving into worst--see Indiana and Arizona and all the other carveouts within carveouts) for eternity.

gboss•30 minutes ago

This is why I think we have to switch. Everyone should be equally miserable

gepeake•about 1 hour ago

> But detractors say it could have economic consequences, particularly for farmers who would have to wrestle with later sunrises.

I genuinely don't understand the "farmer's like DST" argument. Farmer's schedules are dictated by the sun not the time and the sun changes continuously year round. If the argument is about commercial coordination that follows the same logic of being difficult regardless given constantly shifting sunlight, at least without DST there's year-round consistency by the other businesses.

al_borland•about 1 hour ago

DST was never about farmers, it was to conserve energy for the war effort. Farmers also aren't punching a clock at an office. They can start and end work when they want, based on the weather and daylight that suits the work.

quantified•3 minutes ago

If you have animals you are up with the sun, nothing about when you want to work.

scheme271•about 1 hour ago

It also varies depending on where in a time zone you are. The eastern and western sides of a timezone could see sunrise and sunset at significantly different times.

bell-cot•11 minutes ago

THIS. To quote Wikipedia:

> It is a common myth in the United States that DST was first implemented for the benefit of farmers.[40][41][42] In reality, farmers have been one of the strongest lobbying groups against DST since it was first implemented.[40][41][42] The factors that influence farming schedules, such as morning dew and dairy cattle's readiness to be milked, are ultimately dictated by the sun, so the clock change introduces unnecessary challenges.[40][42][43]

marssaxman•about 1 hour ago

I'm glad we're agreed that changing the clocks twice a year is a bad idea, but I don't understand why we should abandon Daylight Savings Time by adopting it permanently. What's so wrong with Standard Time?

Oh, well: whether we put the clocks back or leave them permanently off-by-one, either is better than changing them around over and over.

mysterydip•29 minutes ago

The golf industry prefers daylight savings: https://gbej.org/golf-industry-fights-to-preserve-daylight-s...

Jtsummers•about 1 hour ago

The reason for permanent daylight savings (versus permanent standard) is to provide for later sunsets in the winter. By clock time, the sun would be rising later (after 8am in many places) but setting later as well giving people some late afternoon or evening sun. Which is better is ultimately subjective, you get short days in the winter regardless when you live far enough north.

The late sunrise can be more dangerous with a lot more people traveling in the dark (especially if there's mixed vehicle, bike, and pedestrian traffic, like around schools). So that's also something to consider, and a drawback to this particular choice.

kixiQu•31 minutes ago

> Which is better is ultimately subjective

Most folks subjectively prefer having light after work because that's when it's more fun to do stuff. Unfortunately, the health impacts are (objectively!) worse under permanent daylight saving time.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7954020/ https://www.ama-assn.org/public-health/prevention-wellness/s... https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6436388/ (I've heard there's been some debate on this one, though the association positions stay the same)

cameldrv•18 minutes ago

Most people also prefer to wake up a bit after the sun rises. Daylight Savings approximates having the sun come up at the same time each day. People do not want to wake up in the dark.

cucumber3732842•about 1 hour ago

Morning commutes are way less worse than afternoon ones so it makes sense to prioritize later daylight.

hobonation•about 1 hour ago

Cool. We did this before 1974 and immediately went back, and I never understood why. I guess I'll find out.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/what-happened-the-...

bitshiftfaced•about 1 hour ago

From what I'm reading, it was a big factor that children were walking to school in the dark. One stat I read was that since that time the percentage of kids walking/cycling to school went from almost 50% to now 10%. Maybe that could make the difference this time around.

ClassAndBurn•about 2 hours ago

I finally built my side project and the government finally does something to make it pointless! Yay?

https://www.daylightsmearings.com/

cucumber3732842•about 1 hour ago

There's a life lesson there somewhere.

lioeters•about 2 hours ago

Curious how this affects date/time algorithms and software libraries, particularly those that do not have a way to sync with an external authoritative source of time. I guess they all need to be updated to account for this change?

toyg•about 2 hours ago

They need to be updated anyway, and always have been: somewhere in the world, someone changes time rules basically every year, or even every few months. All current OSes already have support for stating "locale X will not use daylight savings / will always use daylight saving, starting from day yyyymmdd at hhmm" through simple updates.

jauco•about 2 hours ago

Yes there’s databases like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tz_database that track this and that are included in libraries that do the arithmetics. It’s why those libraries are often relatively bulky.

cpburns2009•about 2 hours ago

An updated tz database.

bombcar•about 2 hours ago

Or you set your timezone location to one that’s false, but matches what is now true (like Arizona, for example).

botacode•about 1 hour ago

This will save a lot of lives! Hope it passes.

The shift is a relic of an older economy and damages folks' lives through worse mental health and driving outcomes [0].

[0]: https://www.coveragecat.com/blog/daylight-saving-time-car-in...

dlcarrier•19 minutes ago

It's not the step change in time that's the gratest danger of DST, it's the entire time people are waking up early, increasing cancer rates and all-cause mortality: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6436388/

MilnerRoute•about 1 hour ago

It still needs to pass the Senate.

al_borland•about 1 hour ago

The Senate passed in a few years ago[0]... then the House did nothing. Now the House passes is and we have to hope the Senate does something again. If only Congress could get on the same page and do these things at the same time.

[0] https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/623...

jmclnx•about 1 hour ago

>though its chances in the upper chamber remain unclear

Now they need to get it through the Senate. Maybe we'll see something useful passed during this admin :)