Do we have to "Spring forward" or "Fall back" and why??!
Every year, I dread turning the clock forward and losing that hour of sleep. Like you perhaps, I miss that hour ALL year. But, then we "fall back" in November these days and that means winter is coming. So it's dread all around.
There are some questions about whether "daylight saving or savings time" actually saves energy as designed. Is it really helpful to those of us, tired of driving to work in the dark and leaving for home after dark. Also, is it bad for our health to game our clocks and time, as reported in Urban Legends and reports.
Here are some facts and information about Daylight Savings Time 2014 -- that, if you were in Bermuda or a coma this weekend -- began at 2 a.m. on Sunday. Most of us "spring forward" in after Pesident "W" Bush pushed us back almost a month. The reason was that American productivity might increase if we had more daylight for a longer period in the year.
Daylight Savings ends on November 2nd this year -- yeaaaaa, I get my hour back just in time to think about our family's upcoming bankrupcy over holiday shopping, dinners and events. But, our government does not have a law or mandatory rule about participation in daylight saving time. Some states and U.S. territories don't have to change their clocks, or they just don't do it.
Apparently, Daylight Savings Time has been known to cause problems in most Western countries, it's not really observed in Asian and many eastern countries and Russia abolished this practice in 2011. In 2010, a report came out that noted only 83 percent of people in their case study knew when to move their clocks ahead that spring. And, 27% admitted they'd been an hour early or late at least once in their lives because they hadn't changed their clocks correctly.
Why do we observe daylight saving time anyway?
It turns out that Mr. Franklin, with his "early to bed and early to rise," was the first American to suggest the concept of daylight saving time.
However, it wasn't even observed on a national scale until World War I, when Germany was the first nation state to adopt time changes, to reduce artificial lighting and save coal for the war effort. Both friends and German foes followed suite, and the U.S. adopted the practice in 1918, as the first World War came to a close. But, only a few American states agreed to observe the hour time difference.
When World War II came along, "daylight saving time" came back into practice to save resources for the Allied war effort. As we won the war, it remained an option for U.S. states. But, its practice has come and gone over the years, and actually stopped until the early 1970s. During the 1973-74 Arab oil embargo, the U.S. once again extended daylight saving time through the winter. Records at the time proved that there was a one percent decrease in the country's electrical load, according to federal studies at the time.
Nearly thirty years later, our latest, month-long extension of daylight savings time has been established, after a Bush Administration Act in 2007. Now, our former April to October months of Daylight Saving Time were extended to early March through early November. Who doesn't like more light, after our long, dark winter.
Cannot wait for Spring, but I'll miss that hour until November...just
cannot win!
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