By Lylyan Yenson, Staff Writer
On Tuesday, midterms election rolled through the United States and since then things have changed, including California’s daylight saving time. California Proposition 7 states that California will stay in daylight saving time all year round. 60% of Californians voted against having to set their clocks backward one hour during the winter months, having later sunrise and sunset times. The United States adopted daylight savings time on March 31, 1918.
Daylight saving time (DST) was started in Germany and Austria to conserve fuel to produce electricity power. By moving the clock backwards one hour, the sunrise and sunset times arrived later helping people conserve power during the winter months. During the winter, the days are shorter and the nights are longer, making people wake up later in the day and thus, conserving energy because they can use sunlight instead of turning on light.
DST was also created as a trick to have people wake up earlier instead of sleeping through the daylight hours. The name daylight saving came from saving daylight hours for the most productive time of day.
The cons of daylight saving was the inconvenience it caused to the people. Due to the changing of clocks, people got into more car accidents and receive more workplace injuries. Researchers have also found that the one less hour of sleep caused several heart attacks.
Many people disliked the daylight saving time changes because it completely changed their schedules. People woke up earlier than they needed and slept earlier than they wanted to. Their bodies had to adjust to the one hour difference, and it was a major inconvenience.
Researches have also found that daylight saving time doesn’t help to reduce energy. Although it does reduce fuel used for lighting, it increases heating and AC use and gas consumption. Energy wise, daylight saving time doesn’t work and it is a bother for many people.
The federal law does not require states to follow daylight saving time. Hawaii and most of Arizona don’t follow daylight saving time, but California will be one of the first states to always be in daylight saving time.
