Get ready for sunsets before 5, the clocks change back to daylight savings time Saturday night

On November 1, 2024By Littum

SEATTLE — Well, it’s that time of year to say goodbye to the afternoon light.

When Americans go to bed on Saturday night, they want an extra hour of sleep. Clocks will change around the US early Sunday morning at 02.00

Seattle’s Sunday sunset will be at 4:47 p.m., but the days will continue to shorten until winter solstice on 21 Dec.

The annual time change comes despite Washington lawmakers pushing to keep the state on permanent daylight saving time (DST).

Governor Jay Inslee signed legislation in 2019 it would have allowed the state to switch to permanent daylight saving time.

But that one The Sunshine Protection Act has stalled at the federal level. Without congressional approval, the legislation remains in limbo.

Professor at the University of Washington was among a coalition of sleep physicians pushed the federal government to get rid of daylight saving time last year.

Many people agree that they don’t like changing their watches twice a year, whether they jump forward or backward. But the main argument seems to be whether permanent standard time is the answer.

So why do we even have daylight saving time to begin with? Here are a few facts about the watch.

Who had the idea to change the clocks? It depends on who you ask

The creation of DST is often credited to Benjamin Franklin, who first wrote about the idea in a letter to the editor of Journal de Paris in 1784. Franklin merely suggested that Parisians wake up earlier to save money on lamp oil and candles, and more importantly, he wrote it as satire.

If you enjoy Daylight Savings Time as we know it today, you can thank New Zealand scientist George Vernon Hudson, who presented a paper to the Wellington Philosophical Society in 1895 proposing a two-hour shift forward in October and a two-hour shift back in March. Although there was interest in Hudson’s proposal, and he followed it up with another paper in 1898, the idea never materialized.

Fast forward to 1905, and a man named William Willett came up with the idea of moving the clocks forward in the summer to take advantage of daylight in the mornings and bright evenings. Willett’s idea was picked up by some legislators who introduced legislation, but it was strongly opposed and Willett died in 1915 before his idea could become a reality.

Germany was the first country to adopt daylight saving time

DST was first adopted in Germany during World War I in 1916 to replace artificial lighting so they could conserve fuel for the war effort. It was quickly followed by Britain and many countries from both sides, including the United States

Many countries returned to standard time after World War I, and it was not until World War II that DST returned and remained in many countries.

The law of uniform time

Daylight saving time was not standardized across the United States until the passage of 1966 Uniform Time Actwhich gave the federal government oversight of the time change.

The time change has now been implemented in over 70 countries worldwide. Currently, most of the United States observes daylight saving time with the exception of Hawaii and most of Arizona and the US island territories of Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, American Samoa and Guam.

The time frame used to be different

In the US, daylight saving time starts on the second Sunday in March and ends on the first Sunday in November. But that was not always the case.

According to AARPbefore the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which entered into force in 2007, daylight saving time was observed from the beginning of April to the end of October.

It takes a toll on your health

Losing an hour of sleep every March can take a toll on your well-being, according to sleep experts.

“The switch to daylight saving time has been linked to an increase in heart attacks, strokes, traffic fatalities and workplace injuries – and some sleep experts have called for a stop to skipping ahead altogether.” according to AARP.

Washington isn’t the only state that wants to stop changing the clock

In the past few years, at least 19 states have either passed legislation or passed resolutions to stick to daylight saving time year-round, but implementing that change would require an update to federal law dating back to the Uniform Time Act.

Under that law, states can either observe daylight saving time as it’s currently practiced or stay on standard time year-round — meaning there’s no easy shortcut for those hoping for a permanent shift forward.

So whether you enjoy it or not, remember to set your clocks back one hour on Sunday, November 3rd at