Time for a Change: The long, contentious history of time shifts | Hacker News Reader

Time for a Change: The long, contentious history of time shifts

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32 pointscrescit_eundo46 comments

To summarize all the invitble comments:

"I hate the time shift, just pick one!" (Almost no one likes the time shift, about 90% of people want us to just stay with one. The problem is, 50% of those people want standard time year round and 50% want daylight time)

"California and Florida already voted to stay on Daylight time year round, why don't they?" (Because congress has to pass a law to let them, states can only choose to stay on standard time year round)

"Daylight time year round causes health problems" (There is some weakly supported evidence that this is true, that the human body really wants noon to be at solar noon)

It’s been some time, but I testified in support of a bill on this in Oregon. My understanding at the time (2018?) was that California passed a ballot measure to force the legislature to consider it, but then the legislature let it die in committee. Oregon and Washington passed their bills, but they were contingent on California passing theirs too since no one wanted the I-5 corridor to pass through different time zones.

Yes you are technically correct, the best kind of correct. California passed a ballot measure that allowed the Legislature to take up the issue, but only if the issue would be legal federally. Since the Federal congress hasn't made it legal, they haven't taken up the issue.

The past two years they have tried to take up the opposite -- going to permanent standard time, in association with WA, OR, NV, and ID, so that most of the West would be on the same time zone year round. But that hasn't gotten out of committee.

> "I hate the time shift, just pick one!" (Almost no one likes the time shift, about 90% of people want us to just stay with one. The problem is, 50% of those people want standard time year round and 50% want daylight time)

Time zone preference is only a problem for the people not saying "just pick one". If 90% of people say "just pick one" then we could flip a coin (or commission a study).

The people who don't care about the time shift don't care about the time zone either. They are happy with or at least indifferent to the time changes.

The people saying "just pick one" usually care deeply about which one is picked. We've already done surveys and studies. 45% of the people really want to be on standard time year round, 45% of the people want to be on daylight time year round. The rest don't care.

So we keep the status quo because we can't agree on what to change it to.

so pick 30 minutes as the permanent offset

> 90% of people want us to just stay with one.

> 45% of the people really want to be on standard time year round, 45% of the people want to be on daylight time year round. The rest don't care.

So you think the people that want the swapping to end above all else are a rounding error? I don't. I think it's a significant group of people.

Also it would only take a few of them to break a deadlock.

For example, let's say 42% of voters want standard, 42% want summer, 6% want either, and 10% don't care very much. Of that last 10%, let's pessimistically say that 2/3 will vote against any change and 1/3 will vote yes.

If you put up a vote to end daylight savings in either direction, 42% + 6% + 3.3% vote yes, and 42% + 6.7% vote no. It passes.

> So you think the people that want the swapping to end above all else are a rounding error?

No, they are the 90%.

"Above all else" means they will support permanent summer time and they will support permanent standard time.

When you said the 90% "care deeply about which one is picked", I thought you were saying they cared about that more than the end of daylight savings. If you're not saying that, and they care about it less than the end of daylight savings, then it doesn't matter that they "care deeply about which one is picked". They'll still support ending it in either direction. Do a poll for either option, show 90% support, do it.

When polling is done asking about just one optoin, about 60% support going to permanent standard time instead of switching, and 60% support going to permanent daylight time instead of switching.

So there is a non-trivial number who support just stopping the switch and going to either time zone, but it's not a majority for either option.

So we're back to where we were -- almost everyone wants to stop switching, but there is not any agreement as to which way to stay. Both non-switching options have equal support.

1. If only 60% support either one, then a lot less than 90% want to end switching above all else.

2. If an option has 60% support then just do it already, that's plenty of support.

3. Gallup says that twice as many people want standard time all year as want summer time all year.

You sure about noon mattering? I thought the evidence was that it is when sunrise happens that matters.

> Because congress has to pass a law to let them, states can only choose to stay on standard time year round

Does Congress actually have the power to stop a state adopting whatever time zone it wants?

15 USC 260a(b) expressly supersedes state laws specifying different changeover dates for daylight savings time, and 260a(c) authorizes the Department of Transportation to apply for a federal court injunction against violations of that section.

But, 15 USC 260a doesn't govern what standard time zone applies to each state. That is governed by 15 USC 261 thru 265. However, unlike section 260a, sections 261 thru 265 don't contain any provision analogous to 260a(c), authorizing USDOT to apply for a federal court injunction to enforce it. One might argue that means injunctive relief isn't available for 261 thru 265, hence rendering 261 thru 265 effectively unenforceable. One might also argue that the absence of any provision analogous to 260a(b), expressly superseding state laws, means 261 thru 265 don't supersede state laws, unlike 260a. Of course, we'd have to wait and see what the federal courts make of such an argument, if they ever get presented with it.

Furthermore, 15 USC 261(a) grants the Secretary of Transportation the authority to specify the boundaries between time zones. This means the Secretary of Transportation could potentially move a state to an adjacent time zone without needing any Congressional approval.

Finally, 15 USC 260a(c) grants the Secretary of Transportation the power to apply for a court injunction of enforcement – which could be read as implying only the Secretary of Transportation has this power - meaning if the Secretary of Transportation chose to "turn a blind eye" to a violation, nobody else would have the legal power to do anything about it.

I am not a lawyer, so I must rely on people who are to tell me these things. And they have told me that a state can legally choose which to remain on standard time year round, but they cannot choose which time zone they are in nor can they choose to remain on daylight time year round.

So perhaps you are missing some other laws that govern this? Or perhaps it's a declaration from the Secretary of Transportation that has never been changed?

I think it comes down to legal risk appetite.

If you go by what the law says on its face – yes, you need either approval from Congress or the Secretary, and probably the Secretary has made clear they are unlikely to agree to use whatever powers they technically have in this area.

If you start coming up with inventive legal arguments – then it comes down to whether you can convince the courts to accept them. Maybe you will, maybe you won't. But obviously this is a much more legally risky strategy.

Although, at least in this case, it is unlikely that anyone will go to prison if the courts don't like their inventive legal argument. Still, it would require state officials to risk being ruled against by federal court, and some of them might not view the political consequences of that as acceptable.

So go to standard time and let culture shift? Hard to coordinate admittedly, your boss and your kids schools both have to say 8 is the new 9…

> "Daylight time year round causes health problems" (There is some weakly supported evidence that this is true, that the human body really wants noon to be at solar noon)

Every single association for sleep research and chronobiology that has put out a position paper on the topic has said that standard ("winter") time year-round is best for human health:

* https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30691237

* https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30691158

It is interesting to note that the UK was on summer-time all year between 1968 and 1971. At the end of the period, Parliament voted by a large majority to revert to the previous system.

I think this is a case where people only understood the drawbacks through practical experience.

What were the drawbacks? I guess, what motivated the revert.

late darkness in the morning when you're trying to get your kids on the school bus, or get to work early

Same in the US in the mid ‘70s, in an attempt to save energy due to an oil embargo from Arab oil exporters.

It was widely disliked and dropped as soon as the oil crises was over.

As someone who actually likes the time changes, as part of the annual cycle of stuff that changes and lets the year "breathe", I just want to set up and knock down my favourite anti-DST argument:

"Why should we move the clocks off from (close to) the solar-noon standard? If people want to get up and go to work earlier so as not to 'waste sun', they can do that, and just coordinate it, no need to change the clocks."

I hear this argument frequently, every year. But here's the thing, I've got a great way to do that coordinating. It's called daylight saving time. DST is our way to collectively, without every single business having to change their posted office hours and every school having to adjust their starting times and every club having to adjust their meeting times, agree to move all times one hour earlier/later so as to better line up with the sun. DST itself _is_ the mechanism by which we collectively make that shift.

And it's a good idea.

It's jarring to my system. I like the natural progression of the seasons.

> and just coordinate it

I have never heard that argument before. Why does it need to be coordinated instead of a personal choice?

One of the primary functions of time keeping is coordination between people. The fact that nobody currently exerts their personal preference to not observe daylight savings time would indicate that the social forces overrule individual preference in this domain.

It sounds like a strawman argument.

I've only ever heard the argument of keeping the time fixed and then people can wake up earlier or later depending on their personal preference instead of it being coordinated (mandated) by law.

It's so wild to me that we ever thought it was a good idea to change the clock, rather than just changing when things are scheduled based on local constraints like where the sun is in the sky.

Let's get rid of timezones altogether.

The idea is roughly, "we want an easy way to talk about meetings and 'business hours' without constantly remembering the offset of all the timezones and doing the math".

E.G. a normal person wants to know roughly: morning, mid-day, evening +/- offset. Durations also matter, so an oversimplified version that uses numbers to represent those values appeals to some. 0800, 1400, 2000 (or in lay person time 8am 2pm 8pm)

However the further from the equator anyone is, the less those numbers hold ANY stability or reality over the course of a year. E.G. even in Seattle it barely gets to twilight overnight during the summer, and the length of a day from bright enough to do anything to too dim to safely do stuff is insane. https://www.timeanddate.com/sun/usa/seattle (Take Jun 20: 1:43 of real night, nearly 16 hours of 'real day', and LOTS of practically day besides). Contrast to Orlando https://www.timeanddate.com/sun/usa/orlando (June 20: 6:54 Night, nearly 14 hours of 'real day')

Which is to say, DST doesn't really do much of anything, other than give very equatorial places a slightly easier way of making the evening brighter longer and making it MUCH harder to get to sleep on time with all that bright light.

I saw a map recently where a bunch of US states have passed legislation to stick on daylight time. It seems they are all waiting for federal approval.

https://thehill.com/homenews/nexstar_media_wire/5149485-dayl...

Those posters in contrast with the widespread reception of Daylight savings time and the resistance against it, to the inability to stand against corporate interests. Its truly a timeless American classic... a tradition as old as time: using state propaganda to advance corporate interest and crushing the wants and needs of as many people as it takes.

Do Substack writers follow trends for monetization and write about DST in March? (A bit like YouTube tech reviewers having to talk about new iPhones everytime a new one comes out, gotta chase that ad money, like and subscribe!). This article is yet another discussion about DST, yet another place for people to say how much they hate it, etc etc.

This is fun to see while I’m getting paged 2-dozen times every hour because of DST scheduling errors.

Currently we seem to have more comments in favor of DST (notably, they take a contrarian position). It is sort of funny that hating these times shifts has become so obvious a take that few bother making it, and that many preemptively rebut.

I absolutely hate this Draconian practice.

Hmm. Well, I for one, my spouse for another, LOVE the time shifts—especially the one in the springtime. It is hard for me (us) to imagine not having the time change to DST every year. If the time change is discarded, I certainly hope it is for daylight and not standard time.

By all means, get up early if that fits your internal clock! But please, let's keep the clocks as close to the sun (ie, clock noon at solar noon) as practical.

Standard time in the summer would mean sunrise at about 4AM here in the Seattle area. That'd be fairly disturbing to sleep.

it is not written in the constitution, the bible, or the laws of physics that people have to wake at the time called 6am and have to leave work at a time called 5pm. people can choose to do activites at the time and level of daylight they choose. societies and groups can decide to change their schedules as the seasons change, as they see fit, without the government mandating that our clocks change, which is confusing as hell

But it is written in tons of contracts and maybe the gov redefining "5pm" is better than rewriting all these contracts.

That happens regardless in summer in Seattle, the sun rises very early. The sun also sets very late in summer to the point of being obnoxious and disturbing to sleep. Why does this not matter? No amount of fiddling with the clock changes the reality of how much sunlight there is.

Lifestyle preferences around sunlight should not dictate the clock.

I also prefer the time change system we have. I recognize there are obvious draw backs, but echoing a sibling comment about London. I’m confident if we stopped changing clocks annually, we’d resume the practice in a few years. It is just better to have more afternoon sun in the summer it makes being active with friends and family much easier. If we didn’t change to standard time in the winter, kids would be going to school in pitch black night in most of the country.

> If we didn’t change to standard time in the winter, kids would be going to school in pitch black night in most of the country.

Or, crazy idea I know, but what if we just shifted the school start time by an hour instead??

not a bad idea but every time this idea is floated people freak out because it would make them later for work, etc. etc. etc.

The assumption would be that work starts an hour later at the same time school shifts.

Well if you accept collectively shift all times by an hour, you're effectively arguing for the system we have.

You’re the only person I’ve ever heard express this opinion… ever. Fascinating.

the further north a person lives, the more likely they are to think the time change is helpful

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