“A day without sunshine is like, you know, night.” ― Steve Martin
One of the highlights of autumn and spring is the changing of the clocks, to mark the start of winter and summer. The beginning of "summer time" is just around the corner. On Sunday, clocks will move forward by an hour (at 1am), ushering in the summer time, or daylight saving time (DST) for those in the US and Canada. It's a term we are familiar with. Think: saving energy, making better use of daylight, and so on. There's been some debate about the pros and cons of DST.
In 2018, the European parliament voted to scrap this biannual seasonal time change in spring and autumn. Clocks tend to move forward on the last Sunday in March and also fall back on the last Sunday in October. And the EU change would have come into effect from March 2021, however, it wouldn't have affected the UK, thanks to Brexit.
Many felt that the move was unwarranted and a waste of time (pun intended). This quote from John Flack, a then Conservative MEP for the East of England, sums it all up. He said: “We’ve long been aware the EU wants too much control over our lives – now they want to control time itself."
After the EU vote in 2019, a YouGov poll found that the majority of Britons (44%) were marginally in favour of keeping the clocks with no changes.
The EU plan is now stuck. Due to disagreements in the EU bloc, and not to mention the devastation of the global Covid-19 pandemic across nations. There are more pressing issues at the moment, and changing the clocks is not one of them.
The EU is not alone in this struggle to abolish daylight saving time. The Sunshine Protection Act was re-introduced by bipartisan US Senators, with calls to make DST universally permanent. According to the press release, "the bill would simply negate the need for Americans to change their clocks twice a year."
I think there needs to be more research done around the pros and cons, especially it's health benefits and the downsides. What do you think of daylight saving time (DST)? Would you want to ever change the status quo?
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25 Comments
Very interesting post :)
ReplyDeleteTimes are changin'... literally! 🙂
ReplyDeleteI grumble when we go through the change but then soon adapt and don't think anything of it until the time has to change again. I've never really understood the logic behind it.
ReplyDeleteIts so nice that you dropped by my blog today. I had not had a visit from you in a long time.
ReplyDeleteWe here in Trinidad and Tobago have only 2 Seasons. The Wet Season and The Dry Season.
Our Dry Season this year had given us albeit many days with rain. Its raining as i write.
Happy Sunday
(✿◠‿◠)
much love
Living in Paris and only getting up at 12 o'clock he discovered at 6 o'clock Benjamin Franklin was the first who say something about it. Living in Paris and sleeping till 12 with closed schutters before his windows he waked up one morning at 6 by a terrible noise in the morning that the sun was already shining. Normally he sat for hours in the evening by candlelight and that while candles are expensive and the sun is free. He calculated that Parisians, if they had the same rhythm as he did, would spend 128,000,000 hours unnecessarily in candlelight between March and September. A waste of millions. (He wrote about it to the Journal de Paris in 1784)
DeleteRegardless of what the clock says, the hours of daylight remain the same. I would be perfectly happy staying on one version (I honestly don't care which one) all year long.
ReplyDeleteAh, well, true enough. There really are a lot of pressing issues at the moment.
ReplyDeleteDoesn't really matter to me if we change or not. I guess it will be years before they agree to change or not change.
ReplyDeleteThank you for visiting my blog and leaving a comment. You are always welcome. I do enjoy the longer daylight evenings in the summer with DST, but it taken some time to reset all the clocks twice a year.
ReplyDeletehmm, interesting post. I think the logic of changing the time is to give us more daylight hours. While, I may grumble about time change, I think it has some benefits. Spring ahead and fall back.
ReplyDeleteSeasons change and I guess our body rhythm changes with it. Nice to see you posting!
I hate the time change, agree on one and stick with it
ReplyDeleteI'm for permanent daylight savings. Even a two hour jump instead of one.
ReplyDeletei HATE daylight savings time. i find it totally unnatural.
ReplyDeleteI hate the time changing too, really not that affect me very much, but it's snnoying for many little things...
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion timing should follow the natural daylight and stay the samy all year long!
XO
S
https://s-fashion-avenue.blogspot.com
It’s a tiresome process, especially with small children!
ReplyDeleteInteresting. I don't know if I'll ever really appreciate anything about the whole thing. It makes sense, but we're such creatures of habit and I'm still tired from the lost hour.
ReplyDeleteCheers.
Love the history here. I'm a fan of DST because I'm a total heliophile!
ReplyDeleteGreat to hear from you btw ~ thanks for stopping by!
xoxox,
CC
Interesting history.
ReplyDeleteI love DST in the summer and am sad when we lose it in winter. We have it for a shorter period of the year in Australia. We began it in October and change back this weekend.
ReplyDeleteI would not mind having DST all the time. However, the joy in my heart as I count down the days to DST and the beginning of spring that follows feels so good. Sometimes the anticipation is better than the reality, but I live with hope. When fall comes and we go into darkness again, I pull my self together because I get an hours more sleep that first day.
ReplyDeleteIt doesn't really matter to me if we change or not.
ReplyDeleteThey seem to have been talking about doing away with it for many years and we will probably still be doing so in ten years time!
All the best Jan
Some of our provinces don't change the time. I don't think we should in Ontario.
ReplyDeleteHaving lived my entire life in a country where we never had to reset the clock, I still struggle to grasp the full reason why this is absolutely necessary! I mean I get but on another level, it is quite strange to me.
ReplyDeleteGreat post! am I the only one that like the time change? I hope not.
ReplyDeleteOh very interesting post
ReplyDeleteThanks for visiting and commenting.
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