In this day and age, is daylight savings time still needed and why?

Well, down here in the Lower 48, people like it because they don’t like it being light out at 4:30 in the morning in the summer. And, they don’t need to turn the lights on until 8 or 8:30, or later, in the summer.

And, they don’t like it year round because then in the winter it wouldn’t get light until after 8 in the morning, people don’t like school kids going to school when it is still dark out.

A compromise might be year round ½ hour of DST. But why do you think it isn’t needed?

Because the swinging back and forth twice a year is a real drag, I wonder if it would stand if it was put to a public referendum?
The province of saskatchewan hasn’t used it for year and they seem to be doing just fine.

sorry year=years.

Geography and our orbit don’t change. It is needed for the reason above, depending on where you live.

I guess I’m wondering what ”… this day and age…” has got to do with it? I’m always a little tired for a few days after the changes, but I love the extra daylight hours, it’s worth the price in my opinion.

I’m in thenlower 48 and I’d be very happy to leave it at the daylight savings time all year long. The early night time during our winter months is our standard time and I hate it.

As far as school, which was mentioned above, I understand why that is a comsideration, but school starts are too early anyway in many school districts. Study after study shows that especially for teenagers later school start times lead to better attendance and better grades overall.

@Adagio This day and age because we have electricity now and we are not primarily an agrarian society anymore.

Originally it was for the farmers, as I understand it.

Back in the 1970s during the “energy crisis” there was some research done about how much less energy the US would use for heat and light if we adjusted time so it would not get dark in the afternoon too early.

In the end, I don’t think anything happened – the logistics were too strange – but there was at least the theory that it was energy saving.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daylight_saving_time

People here like having that extra hour of daylight from March to November. More time to play!

@kritiper For me it feels like an hour less. Are you do anything fun before the regular work day that the light benefits you? My relax and be with family time and feel like the day is longer is after 5:00 at night, not before.

To exacerbate my seasonal depression.

@SecondHandStoke Savings time exacerbates it?

@JLeslie We might have electricity but that does not help if you want to garden after dinner or any other outdoor activity, and it’s so pleasant to have the house filled with natural light instead of artificial light, that also comes at a cost.

@elbanditoroso Crop farmers, orchardists and winegrowers etc may find the extra daylight useful but dairy farmers don’t enjoy daylight saving, cows get into a routine with milking and it must be difficult to adjust. When daylight saving first began in NZ there was one rule community, predominantly dairy farmers, who refused to put their clocks forward and just retained the old time, I don’t remember how they fared re: the timing of milk tankers picking up the milk and I don’t know if they accepted daylight saving eventually, it was a long time ago.

@Adagio I know. I prefer the later light. Assuming gardening is done in the summer, and summer is the savings time, you certainly get plenty of light to do that. If you still want to garden at night in the winter months in the evening, then we would be better off staying on savings time.

I would venture to say that most people who work outdoors are accustomed to an earlier schedule. In the summer they favor the early hours to avoid the hottest part of the day, and so their sleep schedule is probably more of an early riser type of schedule. Those people tend to want the earlier sunrise.

Let’s just stay with Standard time and move to something like “Summer/Winter Hours”. If it’s really the energy saver GWBush touted, it would make sense to say something like:

Winter hours (November through April): 9:00 am – 8:00 PM
Summer hours: (May through October) 10:00am – 9:00 PM