The Madness of Resetting Clocks

Yup - it’s that time of year when we make the switch between Daylight Saving Time and Standard Time. 

The jury is still out as to whether or not this is an antiquated and grand inconvenience or sensible change of the clocks.  What we know for sure is that beginning tomorrow the return of Standard Time means an extra hour of sleep.  The sun will rise earlier - which is great if you rise early.  However, if you’re like this retired guy I’d prefer to see the sun a bit longer at the end of the day.  

So the operative questions are:

• Do we permanently switch to Daylight Saving Time?  
• Switch to Standard Time altogether? 
• Or continue with the madness of resetting clocks twice a year?

Steve Calandrillo, University of Washington professor of law, has studied this subject at length.  He has concluded that among other things, we need to abandon the concept of Standard Time inasmuch as early evening darkness is associated with more crime and automobile accidents when contrasted with early morning darkness.

Corporate America concurs.  With more daylight at the end of the day consumers stay out longer spending their money.  And if you like to squeeze-in a late season round of golf you understand the logic.

There is also the mental health angle as well.  Research has suggested that the switch to Standard Time is correlated with depression - a change not associated with the Spring Forward switch.  

Sure, Standard Time is old school and likely more in-sync with our prehistoric hunter-gatherer circadian rhythms - all hard-wired into our DNA for millennia and long before we had time-keeping devices and a Chamber of Commerce.

Nevertheless, this retired guy would enjoy more sunlight during his active time of day.  Opinions are a dime a dozen.

No matter how you slice it the sunshine pie in a given day is always finite.  It's all about being a slave to clocks.  

Before we had time-keeping devices none of this was a problem.

It's madness.....