Fall Back! Daylight Saving Time for 2015 Ends this Sunday
On Sunday, November 1, the United States and parts of Canada will switch from Daylight Saving Time to Standard Time at 2 a.m. Clocks will need to be set back one hour and those in North America will find themselves gaining an additional hour of sleep.
The goal of Daylight Saving Time is to maximize daylight hours available during the workday by adjusting clocks to coincide with the hours during which most people are out and about.
Although Americans with nine-to-five jobs will have sunlight for most of their workday, Daylight Saving Time results in darkness descending much earlier in many places, right before or around the end of the workday. Indeed, several editors here at Frequent Business Traveler have distinct memories of coming home from school as the sun was setting.
The result of having fewer daylight hours also leads to an increase in the number of people suffering from seasonal affective disorder, or SAD. Indeed, many people during the fall and winter months try to counteract the effects of lost sunlight by using bright artificial light therapy.
Ben Franklin is reputed to have first proposed the system of changing clocks in 1784 believing that it would save an “immense sum.” It was not widely adopted until World War I, when the U.S. used Daylight Saving Time as a means of saving energy for war production.
Europe collectively turned its clocks back by one hour on October 25, one week before the end of Daylight Saving Time in North America. Most parts of Asia, Africa, and South America don’t observe Daylight Saving Time at all.
In 2016, Daylight Saving Time will begin on March 13, when clocks will be set forward by one hour. In Europe, Summer Time will begin on March 27.
In the United States and its territories, Daylight Saving Time is not observed in Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and Arizona (except in the Navajo Nation). Until 2006, the counties in the Eastern Time Zone of Indiana did not observe Daylight Saving Time and remained on standard time year round. As of April 2006, all of Indiana observes Daylight Saving Time.
(Photo: Accura Media Group)
