Moving the clocks ahead an hour or back an hour is one of those cultural things that gets a fair bit of attention. It screws some of us up, and our pets don’t when their dinner time is. Come to think of it, neither do we. Body clocks are scrambled a bit for many. People are late or early for work. And while technology has come to our aid – most devices adjust automatically – it can only be another reason the machines decide to take over.
Related: Don’t Forget About F#∉!*^$! Daylight Savings Time (DST) This Weekend
Daylight Savings is one of those things we simply no longer need, and the incoming Trump administration has ended it on their bucket list.
Is it very costly to our nation?
Most of the sources I looked at cite the same piece of research. The 2016 Chmura Economics and Analytics study estimated a loss of about 430 million dollars.
So why does changing clocks cost money? Chmura’s study concluded that setting clocks forward “can lead to an increase in heart attacks, workplace injuries in the mining and construction sectors and increased cyberloafing that reduces productivity for people who typically work in offices.”
Because changing clock times affects sleep, it might also affect people’s circadian rhythms. This circadian misalignment has consequences for workers, including possible drowsiness and added stress to the cardiovascular system
Some studies suggest it could be in the billions, while Chmura’s most recent look published in March of 2024 suggests the new number is 672 million.
Using four categories of cost (heart attacks, strokes, workplace accidents, and traffic accidents), we estimated the total economic cost of daylight saving time for all the MSAs in the United States was approximately $672.02 million annually.[3] This includes $374.75 million from increased heart attacks, $251.53 million from increases in strokes, $18.35 million from additional workplace injuries, and $27.39 million from increases in traffic accidents. The map and table below display the cost for each MSA ranked by Per Capita Cost.
Inflation?
The report does have an interactive map and 21 linked citations. You can fisk it if you feel like this is unsubstantiated nonsense, but the increases in workplace and driving injuries or fatalities make some sense. People are off their game just a bit, so to speak. Or, and this is where I’m coming from, you can agree it’s time to end the practice so we don’t have to take the analog clocks off the walls to move the hands to the correct time and then try to get them to hang right against after.
That’s reason enough for me. And my dog won’t be confused about when dinner time is – critically important stuff.
