Did anyone really think the early implementation of Daylight Savings Time would make a difference? This administration is all about lip service and image and nothing about substance and intelligent action. Is it bashing the administration to challenge supporters to find one energy initiative this administration has proposed or implemented that actually did any good?
The early onset of Daylight Savings Time in the United States this year may have been for naught.
The move to turn the clocks forward by an hour on March 11 rather than the usual early April date was mandated by the U.S. government as an energy-saving effort. But other than forcing millions of drowsy American workers and school children into the dark, wintry weather three weeks early, the move appears to have had little impact on power usage.
That may come as no surprise to the Energy Department, which last year predicted only modest energy savings because the benefits of the later daylight hour would be offset.
Maybe now we can start talking about real solutions to our energy problems.
Savings from early Daylight Savings Time adoption fail to materialize
File this under: Duh!
Uh… after all the fussing about “the administration” in this post, I feel obligated to point out that it was a democrat in the legislative branch that tacked that bad idea onto the 2005 energy bill. The “Energy Department,” which is arguably part of “the administration” actually predicted it wouldn’t make much difference. Like so much other crap out of the legislature, the president has to sign it into law if he wants the rest of the goodies in the legislation, so don’t go trying to pin that particular dumb idea on Bush et al.
Shopping drops off when it’s dark, except during the Christmas season. Guess why DST was changed again….
We should just outlaw dst – its not helping anyone, least of all the farmer/agricultural community – or the other 99% of this country’s citizens
3,
It’s known that the only group interested in DST are the retailers associations.
2,
Yes, but the democrats have their share of idiots as well. The dems did not implement the policy, though. For all we know the idea was put forth as a trap for the administration.
It’s “daylight saving time,” not “savings.”
I think the world should just abolish it. It’s just an inconvenience with no real benefit I’ve ever heard of. Plus, we wouldn’t have the majority of people walking around saying it incorrectly anymore.
I love Daylight Savings Time. Whether or not it saves energy, it gives me an extra hour of daylight in the evening.
And yes, #6, I know that “saving” is singular, but I’m so used to hearing the plural form by now that it sounds better than the “proper” way.
Mexico didn’t follow suit, and that three-week period of inconsistent clocks caused a lot of persistent if minor “jet lag” to people who go back and forth to the States a lot. But I suppose it was a burden mainly to the easily confused, with a price paid by spouses of the easily confused (or so A Close Friend Of Mine tells me, I’d never hint such a thing about my own wife).
What I don’t get it – if it works so well at all, why not make it two hours instead of one? How about three hours? Or since we’re being arbitrary, why not just let 6 a.m. follow the terminator at some arbitrary latitude? That way we could keep everybody REALLY confused.
I think we should change the time every day so it gets dark at 8:30 PM all year long. Problem solved.
#3 How terrible that we would allow businesses to make a little more money. Damn you Bush.
#4 How does it affect the agro community one way or another? The work by what the sun is doing not by what the clock says.
All others that want to blame it on Bush. If you remember it was Jimmy Carter that extended DST for a whole year to save energy.
I and most of the country are going to get out of bed in time to make it to work at 8:00 am. It doens’t matter if it is dark or light out. After work however there are things that I would like to do that do require that the sun be up. I vote make DST the standard all year long.
I and most of the country are going to get out of bed in time to make it to work at 8:00 am.
I vote that you get your ass to work at 7 and leave the rest of us alone.
Time is just a concept. In previous centuries, it wasn’t super-important except for public events like church and warfare and festivals and such. Time really didn’t become important until the great railroads spawned across the USA. People had to be at the station to catch their train, or not.
I like the #7 response, “it gives me an extra hour of daylight in the evening.” No, it doesn’t — the sun sets at the same speed no matter what time it is.
The REALLY stupid thing, for me, is the 8-5 workday (7-4, 6-3 freaks, etc.) — WHY does the business world operates on agricultural timing? I was reading this great article the other day, about a study where some professionals’ workweeks were reduced to 30 hours, some were increased to 50 hours, and of course the control group stayed at 40. Surprise, surprise, the 50 hour and 30 hour people were the most productive, and the 40 hour were the lowest. Go figure.
You there, the one in the corner making sense, shut-up! You’re scaring the norms!!
No doubt that energy savings were insigificant, so, no savings there.
What about the COST to IT departments? I bet this change cost a lot more than it ‘saved’.
I like the extra hour of evening sunlight as well.
I look on it as an extra hour of outdoor recreation opportunity to enjoy life.
[Comment deleted – criticism is accepted, but it must be intelligent.]
I took both sets of dunderheads to get the revision passed – based on the most recent fed study. 1970.
#10 The year-round DST experiment was in the winter of 1974-75, when Gerald Ford was president.
#10, 17 – Even then it was billed as an experiment, wasn’t it? My memory is fuzzy but I think it was. This time it was treated as if no further experiments were necessary. Which is puzzling since it had been tried before. Were there different results in 1974?
#12:
In comment #7, I said that DST gives me an extra hour of daylight “in the evening”. This is true. I know that DST doesn’t magically give us an extra hour of daylight, but I would gladly sacrifice an hour of morning daylight so I can do more in the evening after work.
Are you actually serious with this?
#17 Actually it was Nixon
http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=4073
21,
Not really, but I have a minds-eye image of members of congress calling out ludicrous ideas for the president to leap upon, kind of like the name sequence in Pilate’s court during the film “Life of Brian”. (“Ethanol from rutabegas! Brilliant!”)
Actually, what I meant as a joke (in #10) was that the time should change every day so that the sun sets at exactly 8:30 every day of the year.
Esteban, I’m with you. Why save daylight during the time of year when we have plenty only to throw it away when there is so little. [Yes, I know the daylight doesn’t really go anywhere. It just means keeping it for a time of day when we’re awake.] The time of day is purely arbitrary anyway. I say move the clock forward 2 hours all year long and enjoy the daylight in the evening.
For so much of the year, we don’t even get to see daylight on most days. At most, we might get a little in the morning and darkness by the time we get home. During the winter months, wouldn’t it be nice to have some daylight when we get home from work?
23 – who needs congress for that?
“Hey, let’s appoint a horse show promoter to take care of disaster recovery!”
“Let’s name a political hack to head up the NASA scientists!”
“You wanted to be a wartime president, let’s tell everybody lies and get it done – they’ll never catch us!”
“Ethanol from rutabagas! Brilliant!”
…the Bushies are doing just fine without any help from outside.
One of the problems with DST is the name; Americans hate to save.
Maybe if we called it Daylight-Sale-aThon
I say, take the Congressmen who voted for it and put them on a large hamster wheel in front of the Capitol. Hook it up to a battery and have them charge it for half an hour. Not only is this an infinitely renewable resource, it will also stave off global warming due to reduced hot air emissions.
Hey, let’s just change AM to PM and then we’d have a whole night full of day.
Why the eff not start work an hour earlier and go home an hour earlier?