Arizona: Visionary
Why? Because we don't have daylight savings time. I have argued for years that DST may have made sense when electricity demand was driven by lighting, but air conditioning actually reverses the equation, putting people at home during more of the cooling hours. The Liberty Papers links to a study with similar results:
Our main finding is that"”contrary to the policy's intent"”DST increases residential electricity demand. Estimates of the overall increase are approximately 1 percent, but we find that the effect is not constant throughout the DST period. DST causes the greatest increase in electricity consumption in the fall, when estimates range between 2 and 4 percent. These findings are consistent with simulation results that point to a tradeoff between reducing demand for lighting and increasing demand for heating and cooling. We estimate a cost of increased electricity bills to Indiana households of $9 million per year. We also estimate social costs of increased pollution emissions that range from $1.7 to $5.5 million per year. Finally, we argue that the effect is likely to be even stronger in other regions of the United States.
Philip:
I would still rather have more daylight as most of my hobbies involve me getting out of my house. The more hours of sunlight left after the workday is over, the more I get to enjoy my hobbies. I realize that I am not an average American in this regard though. Someone has to advocate for DST!
March 9, 2009, 3:14 pmCraig:
I spent the weekend down in the country about an hour south of Buffalo and thus had to commute back into town at 6am this morning. It's still deep winter up here, of course, and by last weekend it had only just started getting light at that time. Now, thanks to DST on steroids, it's pitch dark. Heavy traffic is coming at you from all sides in the blackness and tiny children walk to school and wait for the bus -- and they're damned hard to see. And the extra AC you talk about equates to the extra heat we have to use in the morning here as we get up before the Sun. Brilliant, just brilliant
March 9, 2009, 5:14 pmDavid W.:
I was in Indiana for school, and I found it particularly irritating - they were doing it right until just recently! They changed it for 'economic' reasons; I think mainly the state government wanted to appear to be doing something but avoid doing anything particularly significant.
On Philip's point - I wouldn't mind if the sun wasn't overhead until 1; it's just the change that gets my goat. Fortunately, Congress seems to be moving toward year round DST, so maybe someday I can get away without changing my clocks.
March 9, 2009, 6:02 pmEvilRedScandi:
Daylight Savings Time sucks so hard it has an event horizon.
March 9, 2009, 6:05 pmMike:
I don't believe DST saves energy.
I do believe that it gives people an extra hour of daylight in the evening for outdoor activities. In that case, that should make DST year round.
March 10, 2009, 4:24 amJens Fiederer:
The whole idea that government can affect the number of hours of daylight by fiddling with the reporting of time is repugnant to me.
It also leads to problems occasionally, as when a customer wanted an important but time-consuming process scheduled at 2:30am every night (they were able to set this themselves in a configuration screen) and then complained to us that it never ran - on a night that never HAD a 2:30am!
What is wrong with businesses just declaring their own summer hours if they so wish? They do ANYWAY sometimes!
March 10, 2009, 6:35 ambryan:
I thought the standard argument was that it was all the evil "golf lobby" forcing DST on us because it is a boon to their business. Their evil golfing corporations that I mean . . . Hmm, now I can't remember, is it the "golf lobby", or "big golf"?
March 10, 2009, 7:19 amDamon Gentry:
I've always said (jokingly), that we should just split the difference and adjust our clocks ahead/back by 30 minutes and then keep it there year round.
March 10, 2009, 8:39 amNASCAR Wife:
In the summer, all I want in the evening is for that the big ball of fire in sky disappear as soon as possible so that I can start enjoying the 105 degrees in the shade.
Always thought daylight savings time and all the arguements for it were stupid.
March 10, 2009, 8:55 ammishu:
In the summer, all I want in the evening is for that the big ball of fire in sky disappear as soon as possible so that I can start enjoying the 105 degrees in the shade.
Try moving north. All these complaints against DST come from the south where the amount of sunlight don't change so much. I can understand parents wanting their kids to go to school in sunlight during the winter and at the same time I understand people want more daylight in the summer evenings. What makes sense in one area of the country may not make sense in others. There are these things called state governments. Use them. Quit looking at Washington for your problems.
March 10, 2009, 10:28 amOT Emergency!!!!!:
Worst case scenario confirmed! Run for your liiiiives!!!!
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article5882341.ece
March 10, 2009, 11:00 amchris:
Let's just put a GPS in everyone's watch, eliminate time zones and go to continuous gradient time.
March 10, 2009, 1:40 pmPaul:
I really wish they would just pick one and leave it alone. I like end-of-day light, but I like it in the morning too. Makes it harder to sleep in.
I love how it DST affects two little AZ towns. Beaver Dam is between St George UT and Mesquite NV--the affect being that Beaver Dam is with Mesquite for half the year, and St George for the other half. Same scenario in Hildale UT/Colorado City AZ. These twin cities are a single community but are on different time Zones for post offices/official business for now more than half of each year.
March 10, 2009, 3:04 pmJohnB:
bryan --- it's actually "the vast golf-wing conspiracy".
March 10, 2009, 3:36 pmKeetha:
Aha! Just as I suspected, the measure does not save energy. So why, then? I don't like it - I'd rather have the daylight in the morning.
March 10, 2009, 5:59 pmJeff:
Amusingly, some Indiana (South Bend) schools were delayed this morning, due to darkness and rain. Why doesn't anybody think about the children??!??! http://www.wsbt.com/weather/closings
March 10, 2009, 9:24 pmCraig:
Yeah, Paul, but Hilldale and Colorado City are home to the polygamy communities. Do they abide by Gentile-imposed clock changes? Do they have clocks?
March 10, 2009, 10:11 pmfrank:
As a scientist, I find this political tinkering with the earth's rotation a huge joke. In the increasingly globalized world, we should ALL use GMT, so that any one point in time is EXACTLY the number that it says.
March 11, 2009, 5:48 pmEach individual time zone can have names for certain times of the sidereal day, such as, dawn, mid-morn, noon, mid-aft, eve, night, etc. which are changeable, but the GMT digits are IRREFUTABLE and exact.
Henry Bowman:
You simply do not understand. DST has absolutely nothing to do with savings energy -- only an idiot Congressman (redundancy alert!) would think that. It exists so people have more time to play golf after work (I am completely serious here).
March 17, 2009, 8:28 pm