Clocks will skip ahead an hour at 2 a.m. Sunday for daylight saving time in most of the U.S., creating a 23-hour day that throws off sleep schedules, plunges early-morning dog walks into darkness and inspires millions of complaints.
In Virginia, the push to end the twice-a-year clock change has stalled. A Virginia House committee this week recommended dropping the issue until 2027. The state is one of half a dozen that have adopted bills to switch to permanent standard time in one legislative chamber in the last two years, though Virginia’s measure included a caveat: the change would only take effect if Maryland and Washington, D.C., also made the move.
Even though polls show most people dislike the system that has most Americans changing clocks twice a year, the political moves necessary to change it haven’t succeeded because opinions on the issue and its potential impacts are sharply divided.
Want to make daylight saving time permanent? That would mean the sun rises around 9 a.m. in Detroit for a while during the winter. Prefer staying on standard time year round? That would mean the sun would be up at 4:11 a.m. in Seattle in June.
“There’s no law we can pass to move the sun to our will,” said Jay Pea, the president of Save Standard Time, an organization devoted to switching to standard time for good.
A dilemma for policymakers
Since 2018, 19 states — including much of the South and a block of states in the northwestern U.S. — have adopted laws calling for a move to permanent daylight saving time.
There’s a catch: Congress would need to pass a law to allow states to go to full-time daylight saving time, something that was in place nationwide during World War II and for an unpopular, brief stint in 1974.
The U.S. Senate passed a bill in 2022 to move to permanent daylight saving time. A similar House bill hasn’t been brought to a vote.
U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, a Republican from Alabama who introduces such a bill every term, said the airline industry, which doesn’t want the scheduling complexity a change would bring, has been a factor in persuading lawmakers not to take it up.
U.S. Rep. Greg Steube, a Florida Republican, is proposing another approach.
“Why not just split the baby?” he asked. “Move it 30 minutes so it would be halfway between the two.”
Steube thinks his bill could get bipartisan support. The change would make the U.S. out of sync with most of the world — though India has taken a similar approach and in Nepal, the time is 15 minutes ahead of India.
Sleep experts prefer more daylight in the morning
Karin Johnson, the vice president of the advocacy group Save Standard Time and a professor of neurology at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, said permanent standard time — with the sun straight overhead close to noon — would help students, drivers and practically everyone else function better year-round.
“Morning light is what’s really critical for setting our circadian rhythms each day,” she said.
Kenneth Wright, a professor and director of the Sleep and Chronobiology Laboratory at the University of Colorado, said the risk of fatal vehicle crashes, heart attacks and strokes increases in the days that follow turning the clock forward.
“Based on the evidence for our health and well-being and safety, the best option for us as a country now is to choose to go to permanent standard time,” he said.
Obstacles block change
Of all U.S. states, only Arizona — except the Navajo Nation — and Hawaii currently opt out of daylight saving time. About 1 in 10 U.S. adults favor the current system of changing the clocks, according to an AP-NORC poll conducted last year. About half oppose that system, and some 4 in 10 didn’t have an opinion. If they had to choose, most Americans say they would prefer to make daylight saving time permanent, rather than standard time.
Most of those measures included caveats that the change would only take effect if neighboring states also made the move. That could partially answer some of the concerns from groups including broadcasters who warn of schedule confusion. It wouldn’t solve the concerns of the golf industry, which opposes full-time standard time because that would make it harder for people to get in a round in the evening. Many full-time daylight time bills have similar provisions.
Scott Yates, a Colorado man who runs the website Lock the Clock, wants the federal government to pass a law to end the twice-a-year clock change in two years. Under his plan, states would have to commit to either daylight saving or standard time.
As long as the clock changes persist, Yates has some advice.
“If you’re the boss, tell all your employees on Monday that they can come in an hour later,” he said. “And if you aren’t the boss, tell your boss that you think you should come in an hour later on Monday. Sleep in for safety.”
