Down With Harmful Daylight Saving Time

Daylight Saving Time starts Sunday, but no one benefits from it, writes Bora Zivkovic in Scientific American. It will take days for our bodies to adjust to the lost hour—we're essentially "jet-lagged for a few days"—and even cows will suffer when they're milked an hour earlier than they're used to. And for what purpose? DST was established back when lighting was the biggest energy need, so changing the clocks to maximize daylight hours saved electricity. Nowadays, that's no longer true.

With factories, nuclear plants, airports, computers, and other "time-independent" things using up the bulk of our energy, energy companies have actually done studies concluding DST no longer saves energy. Other studies have shown that in the days following DST, traffic accidents, workplace injuries, heart attacks, and depression increase. Common sense seems to dictate we stop the practice—but since "it's a bit unclear who exactly" is in charge of the whole idea (Congress? Individual states? Counties?), it will probably never be abolished. Click for Zivkovic's full column. (More daylight saving time stories.)