Springing forward and falling back has become a routine, with many people across the world adjusting their clocks likewise when the season comes around. Doing so means less daylight in the mornings but more in the afternoon, giving people more active time in the sunlight. The concept can be traced back to Benjamin Franklin, who famously insisted that “Early to bed, and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise”.
Franklin served as the ambassador to France and in 1784 anonymously wrote a satirical letter which encouraged drastic measures, such as the firing of cannons and the ringing church bells, to awaken the slumbering Parisians at a time such that they may be able to enjoy more of the daylight. More than a century later, an English builder and businessman named William Willett expressed a similar dismay at how much of London was dormant during the first few hours of daylight. Due in part to this — and because he did not like cutting his golf game short due to lack of sunlight — Willett began to lobby for Daylight Saving Time in 1907 and did not relent until his death in 1915.
The following three years saw Daylight Saving Time’s acceptance in most of Europe and the United States. It was observed for seven months, but it became so unpopular that it was repealed by veto and became a local option. World War II and the Roosevelt administration saw the inception of “War Time”, which was a year-round Daylight Saving Time that lasted from 1942 to 1945, but was then quickly replaced by the local adaptations for twenty more years. This caused plenty of confusion, especially in the communication and transportation industries, as radio, TV, and train stations all had to post separate times as different areas adopted Daylight Saving Time. It was not until 1966, when President Johnson passed the Uniform Time Act, that Daylight Saving Time as we know it today came into being. Despite a few revisions over the next forty years, the Uniform Time Act set the framework for the national unification of Daylight Saving Time.
Daylight Saving Time does not alter the length of the day since it only arbitrarily changes the way the hours correspond to the actual parts of the day, but within the change to the structure lay some inherent benefits. The work and school day begins as the sun rises and ends in time for several hours of afternoon outdoor leisure, allowing extracurricular sports for students as well as recreational activities for adults. In theory, Daylight Saving Time encourages energy conservation, since people are more active during times when artificial lighting is unnecessary, but conclusive statistical evidence is difficult to acquire.
The retail sector of the economy benefits greatly from Daylight Saving Time as more daylight hours results in more of an interest in shopping after work and for things like sporting goods. Research shows a conclusive link between a decrease in traffic accidents and the onset of Daylight Saving Time, but the effect on crime is less clear. Studies have shown that the link between outdoor light and crime is often contradictory, and further quantitative research has proven difficult. Daylight Saving Time also serves as a convenient reminder to change the batteries in smoke detectors, which, although not inherent to Daylight Saving Time itself, is a pleasant benefit. Extra hours of activity in the daylight lead to more sun exposure, a fact which may or may not have positive implications on skin health; a certain level of exposure is necessary for Vitamin D synthesis, but too much can lead to skin cancer.
Daylight Saving Time has its share of opposition. The inconvenience of changing clocks and adjusting to a new schedule is one that seems unjustified by the benefits. Beyond being a nuisance, the process of adjusting to new sleep patterns is blamed for an increase in the severity of automobile accidents and a decrease in work productivity. Some argue that the energy saved by spending more waking hours in the sunlight is offset by the usage of other forms of energy, such as gasoline used when driving around in the afternoon. Professions, such as farming, that rely on the passage of time itself rather than the arbitrary changes in hours find adjusting their labor schedules to Daylight Saving Time strenuous and unnecessary.
Confusion also exists in the actual mechanical process of changing the clocks, which in some cases cannot be done easily and consumes time. Those who work across time zone boundaries and through different local jurisdictions may find themselves having to adjust to several different adaptations of Daylight Saving Time. Certain crucial machinery, such as computer software programs and medical devices, may malfunction without any indication of a problem at the most inopportune times, requiring much revision on the part of software designers.
The application of Daylight Saving Time has been carefully honed over its century of practice. In order to minimize confusion, the time shift is normally scheduled for a weekend and all done at one time, although some areas use twenty or thirty minute shifts. Different methods of coordination exist, with the European Union all shifting at the same time and the United States shifting when the local time is 2:00AM.
The beginning of Daylight Saving Time varies by location. European Summer Time begins on the last Sunday in March and ends on the last Sunday in October, a practice that has lasted since 1996. Due to the Energy Policy Act of 2005, the date of change for the United States in 2007 onward is the second Sunday in March, lasting to the first Sunday in November. The previous starting date was the first Sunday in April, lasting through the last Sunday in October, and Congress retains the right to change the date back pending an energy-consumption study. Beginning and ending dates are reversed in the Southern hemisphere, leading to variable time differences between Northern and Southern hemisphere locations depending on the time of year.
Due to the disorienting effect that the unexpected onset of Daylight Saving Time can have on planned events, plenty of unique events have occurred. One man was able to avoid the Vietnam War draft due to the local interpretation of Daylight Saving Time, which when taken into consideration, changed his birthday to a day with a much higher draft lottery number. A bombing that was scheduled to hit two busloads of innocents in the West Bank in 1999 was bungled by terrorists who misunderstood the timing on the bombs due to Daylight Saving Time. The onset of Daylight Saving Time can reverse the documented order of twin births if the first is born right before the time change and the second is born after. Such an event would certainly be vexing for the purposes of primogeniture and general sibling rivalry.
Daylight Saving Time is a confusing concept, one that manages to make perfect sense in plenty of ways and yet seem vaguely unnecessary in several others. But as long as springing forward and falling back continues to merely encompass changing clocks and smoke detector batteries for the sake of soaking up another precious hour of daytime, the tradition will endure.
In the United States in 2008, Daylight Saving Time begins at 2:00am on the second Sunday of March 9th. Remember to set your clocks ahead one hour – Spring forward!
