Daylight saving time means the clocks spring forward an hour this weekend. But in an unscientific poll, Elon Musk asked people on X what the U.S. should do with the clocks if the time change was canceled.
Of those who responded, 58% wanted an hour later, 42% an hour earlier.
The always-contentious issue of time change is raising questions about whether President Donald Trump could or would permanently end daylight saving time in the United States.
In December he posted, “The Republican Party will use its best efforts to eliminate Daylight Saving Time, which has a small but strong constituency, but shouldn’t!” on his social media site Truth Social in December. “Daylight Saving Time is inconvenient, and very costly to our Nation.”
Here’s what to know efforts to end the time change, why it exists in the first place and what experts think about it (hint: They’re not fans).
What is daylight saving time?
Daylight saving time is the time between March and November when all but two states adjust their clocks ahead by one hour. You lose an hour of sleep but get an extra hour of light as the sun sets an hour later.
This year it occurs at 2:00 a.m. on Sunday, March 9, when clocks will move ahead to 3:00 a.m. everywhere but Arizona and Hawaii, which have opted out.
The practice originally meant to add more daylight to the working day during World War I and save energy costs. That law also established the five time zones America still uses.
Daylight saving time controversy nothing new
There have been hundreds of efforts to do away with daylight saving time dating back to the original WWI law. That one lasted a year-and-a-half and was repealed in 1919 when the war ended.
It came back during World War II, when it was implemented in February of 1942 as “war time.”
That law, too, was repealed when the war ended and the federal government stepped out of the process. Some states, counties and even cities kept daylight saving time and some didn’t, leading to significant confusion.
In 1966, Congress passed the Uniform Time Act, setting national standard time and establishing daylight saving time from the last Sunday in April to the last Sunday in October. States could chose to implement it or not. Two opted out – Arizona and Hawaii.
In 1974 during the energy crisis, President Richard Nixon signed a year-round daylight saving time law called the Emergency Daylight Saving Time Energy Conservation Act, hoping to maximize evening light and save fuel. The effort was highly unpopular and lasted less than a year. Many parents complained the rules made early mornings so dark they were a danger for children going to school.
In 2005 President George W. Bush extended daylight saving time so it began in the second Sunday in March and ended on the first Sunday in November. This was part of the Energy Policy Act and was meant to save energy.
Why do so many people want to stop changing the clocks?
As long as there’s been daylight saving time there have been efforts to stop the twice-yearly clock-changing ritual.
Farmers didn’t like it because even when clocks changed, animals’ needs didn’t.
For humans, the arguments were medical. It disrupted sleep cycles until people adjusted and caused increased accidents. There’s some evidence that the change can cause temporary increase in heart attacks and strokes.
There’s also concern about fiddling around with what some call “natural” time, which allows people’s bodies to be in tune with the changing duration of light and dark that creates circadian rhythms.
According to the National Council of State Governments, state legislatures have considered at least 750 bills and resolutions concerning daylight saving time, most of them wanting to make it permanent.
In 2022 the U.S. Senate voted to make daylight saving permanent, a proposal called the Sunshine Protection Act that was first introduced in 2018. Arizona and Hawaii, which use permanent standard time, would not have been required to switch to permanent daily saving time. The House did not pass it and it died.
Cancel daylight saving time? (Or maybe make it permanent?)
The biggest question around getting rid of daylight saving time is whether to do away with it altogether or keep it year-round — A dilemma Musk references in his poll.
When the Associated Press asked the same question in 2019, 40% of Americans wanted standard time all year round, 31% wanted daylight saving time all year round and 28% wanted to continuing switching back and forth.
A new Sunshine Protection Act was introduced into Congress on January 3. It would make daylight saving time permanent. States with areas exempt from daylight saving time could choose the standard time for those areas. Supporters of the bill call their proposal “locking the clock.”
But many aren’t so sure.
The problem with switching to permanent daylight savings time rather than permanent regular time is that mornings will be darker all year round, said Kenneth Wright, who runs the sleep and chronobiology laboratory at the University of Colorado Boulder.
“The sun doesn’t change, we’re just changing how we schedule our lives relative to the sun,” he said.
That’s a problem at 7:30 in the morning when kids are going to school and adults are driving to work, he said.
“In Miami it’s more than 130 days of darker mornings when kids are going to school at 7:30 am, compared if we adopt permanent daylight saving time,” he said. “The number of permanent standard time days in which it would be dark at 7:30 am is zero.”
“In Texas and Los Angeles, it’s more than 100 days,” he said.
The American Academy of Sleep Medicine in 2020 called for eliminating daylight saving time, and updated its statement in 2023 to clarify that it supported switching to permanent standard time, not permanent daylight saving time.
“By causing the human body clock to be misaligned with the natural environment, daylight saving time increases risks to our physical health, mental well-being, and public safety,” said Dr. M. Adeel Rishi, and a pulmonary, sleep medicine, and critical care specialist at Indiana University Health in Indianapolis.
“Permanent standard time is the optimal choice for health and safety,” he said.
(This story has been updated to add new information.)
