Daylight saving time started this morning, and you may still be out of sorts from losing an hour of sleep and your body insisting it’s earlier than the clocks say it is.
Many Americans, and a series of Florida lawmakers, would like to leave the clocks on daylight saving time all year long and stop changing it. The idea of not going through this twice a year has appeal.
Florida has already passed legislation “locking the clock” to make daylight saving time permanent, but it requires an act of Congress before it can go into effect. Florida (and any state) could decide to stick to standard time year-round without anyone else’s approval, but so far lawmakers and lobbyists in the Sunshine State have pushed for permanent DST (although one Florida lawmaker wants to split the difference).
Wouldn’t year-round daylight saving time work better?
Actually, the United States tried that once. It didn’t go so well.
When daylight saving time lasted all year
In December 1973, when gas prices were skyrocketing due to an OPEC oil embargo, then-President Richard Nixon and other leaders struggled to deal with the ongoing energy crisis. Lines at gas stations stretched out and gas prices soared. Gasoline was rationed. A national speed limit of 55 mph was enacted. Gas-guzzler cars stopped selling, and economy car sales boomed.
And Congress voted to put the U.S. on daylight saving time year-round for two years to reduce electricity consumption in the evening and conserve fuel.
It was changed back before the year was out.
Permanent daylight saving time was a failure
Almost immediately, there were complaints of children going to bus stops or teens driving to school in pitch blackness.
By the end of January, eight Florida schoolchildren were killed in accidents compared to two in the same time period the year before, just some of the accidents reported around the country. According to The New York Times, a spokesman for Florida’s education department said that “six of the deaths were clearly attributable to the fact that children were going off to school in darkness.”
Responding to the deaths and many angry parents, then-Gov. Reubin Askew called a special session of the Florida Legislature to consider a return to standard time, the Times reported. Then-Senator Lawton Chiles, later Florida’s governor, joined in the call to repeal the two-year measure right away.
American approval of the change, which was 79% before it was enacted, dropped to 42% in February.
Less than half a year into the change, Congress voted to repeal permanent daylight saving time.
This was the third time the U.S. made DST permanent. The previous times, in World Wars I and II, ended when the wars ended.
What would permanent daylight saving time be like?
The hours of available daylight dwindle as winter approaches and increase in the spring. Daylight saving time just moves the clock.
If we didn’t “fall back” and set our clocks back an hour in November, sunrise would be around 7:40 a.m. and sunset would be around 5:40 p.m. By the end of December through January, sunrise would be around 8:18 a.m., well after most kids were in school.
Sunsets would be later, allowing for more outdoor activities after school and work, which is a boon in a state so dependent on tourist dollars and a big reason why so many people are in favor of it. But schoolchildren would be in the dark in the mornings, and commuters would have to deal with more fog, frost and hazardous conditions on the way to work.
In comparison, standard time means earlier sunrises and sunsets, which some argue increases safety in the mornings for schoolchildren and is more in line with our biological circadian rhythms. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine, the American Medical Association and the National Sleep Foundation have all urged for a change to year-round standard time.
When does daylight saving time end?
Daylight saving time ends at 2 a.m. Sunday, Nov. 1, 2026, at which time clocks “fall back” and reset to 1 a.m.
C. A. Bridges is a journalist for the USA TODAY Network-Florida’s service journalism Connect team. You can get all of Florida’s best content directly in your inbox each weekday day by signing up for the free newsletter, Florida TODAY.
(This story was updated because an earlier version included an inaccuracy.)
This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Would permanent daylight saving time work? It didn’t before
Reporting by C. A. Bridges, USA TODAY NETWORK – Florida / The Daytona Beach News-Journal
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
