Daylight Saving Time

It’s Daylight Saving Time again.

Daylight Saving Time, DST for short, is the convention of advancing clocks so that afternoons have more daylight and mornings have less. Typically clocks are adjusted forward one hour near the start of spring and are adjusted backward in the fall. On March 8, 2009 at 02:00 AM local time move your clock forward to 03:00 AM. This applies to The United States, Canada, The United Kingdom, Cuba, and France.

Contrary to popular belief Daylight Saving Time was not invented by Benjamin Franklin. Although he anonymously published a satire suggesting that People could economize on candles by rising earlier to use morning sunlight. Actually an English architect and outdoorsman, William Willett proposed the idea of DST in 1907. This would allow him more time to play golf late in the day, during the summer months. Although Daylight saving(s) time is a common variant, William Willett's original proposal used the term daylight saving time.

During World War I Germany and its allies were the first to implement Daylight Saving Time to save fuel. Britain, the rest of Europe, Russia and the United States quickly followed. The United States adopted DST in 1918.

Adding an hour of sunlight at the end of the day is primarily a "lifestyle benefit," but it's mainly the promise of energy savings that got this bill passed in 2005. The theory behind the fuel savings is that most people sleep through sunrise and businesses are closed, also most people are up at sunset and businesses are open. So if you can move the daylight to the evening, you have the potential to save a lot of energy. Similarly, while bad guys are usually asleep in the early morning, dusk brings about prime time for crime. The extra light late in the day decreases the crime rate. Later light also reduces car crashes, which tend to increase after dark.

Clock shifts are usually scheduled near a weekend midnight to lessen disruption to weekday schedules. The US altered the dates for DST in 2007, often referred to as the “Y2k7” problem. Starting in 2007, most of the United States and Canada observe DST from the second Sunday in March to the first Sunday in November, almost two-thirds of the year. Previously, from 1987 through 2006, the start and end dates were the first Sunday in April and the last Sunday in October.

A common practice while adjusting your clocks is to change the batteries in your home smoke detectors.