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Daylight saving time is coming to an end for 2025. This Sunday, Nov. 2, clocks “fall back” and we gain an hour. Here’s what to know about the seasonal time change.
Daylight saving time comes to an end on Sunday, Nov. 2, at 2 a.m., when the time goes back to 1 a.m.
Daylight saving time began last spring on March 9. Clocks will “spring forward” next year on March 8, 2026, when daylight saving time returns.
People will gain an hour as clocks fall back on Sunday. For most Americans, that means an extra hour of sleep.
Many digital clocks will automatically reset overnight, but remember to change any watches or clocks that need to be manually adjusted.
After the time change, darkness will arrive earlier in the evening, and sunrise in the morning will also come earlier.
Annual clock changes have been around for decades, but the origins of the practice remain something of a mystery. People have pointed toward farmers wanting more daylight or cited various proponents of getting up earlier in the day, but some of those theories are disputed.
Germany began observing daylight saving time in 1916 during World War I, with the thought that it would save energy. Other European countries and the U.S. followed suit in the next few years.
There was some debate around the practice in the decades that followed, but eventually, daylight saving time was enacted in the U.S. as a legal requirement by the Uniform Time Act of 1966, according to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics.
While clocks will change for most of the U.S., there are two states and several territories that do not observe daylight saving time. Clocks will not change in Hawaii or Arizona (except for in Navajo Nation), American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico or the U.S. Virgin Islands, according to the Department of Transportation, which oversees the nation’s time zones
States can opt out of observing daylight saving time, but they cannot choose to permanently be on daylight saving time.
Most countries around the world do not observe daylight saving, with the U.S. and most of Europe being the exception rather than the rule, according to Pew Research Center. Among countries that do change their clocks, most of them rolled back an hour in October, according to timeanddate.com.
A 2022 CBS News/YouGov poll found that nearly 80% of Americans supported changing the current system, with more Americans preferring daylight saving time to standard time.
That same year, the Senate passed a bill called the Sunshine Protection Act that would have made daylight saving time permanent, but it never advanced in the House of Representatives.
President Trump, before his return to office for his second term, said he’d push to eliminate the time change.
“The Republican Party will use its best efforts to eliminate Daylight Saving Time, which has a small but strong constituency, but shouldn’t! Daylight Saving Time is inconvenient, and very costly to our Nation,” he wrote on Truth Social in December of last year.
While his December comment called for the elimination of daylight saving time, Mr. Trump has, in the past, called for permanent daylight saving — that is, keeping clocks shifted one hour ahead.
There have been a number of studies finding that changing clocks twice a year can be disruptive for people’s health. In addition to impacting mood and mental health, researchers at Stanford Medicine this year said that falling back and springing forward may lead to an increase in heart attacks, obesity and strokes.
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LITTLETON – For deer, the fall time change Sunday morning means trouble: a 16% spike in collisions with vehicles over the following week, despite years of safety campaigns and the construction of 75 special crossings along highways.
Drivers in Colorado collided with at least 54,189 wild animals over the past 15 years, according to newly compiled Colorado Department of Transportation records. That’s far fewer than in many other states, such as Michigan, where vehicle-life collisions often number more than 50,000 in one year.
The carnage — especially this time of year — increasingly occurs where animals face the most people along the heavily populated Front Range, beyond the mountainous western half of the state that holds much of the remaining prime habitat, state records show.
State leaders and wildlife advocates gathered on Thursday near one of the crossings along the high-speed C-470 beltway in southwest metro Denver to launch a safety campaign.
“We’ve made wildlife crossings a priority in our rural areas, and also increasingly in urban areas,” CDOT Director Shoshana Lew said. “We cannot put underpasses and overpasses everywhere. Particularly at this time of year, we urge everyone to be careful of wildlife.”
Lew credited the crossings with containing collision numbers that could be much higher in Colorado, given the traffic and the prevalence of deer and other wild animals. Most of the state’s highway construction projects, such as the work on Interstate 25 north of Colorado Springs that includes a large wildlife bridge, will factor in wildlife safety needs, Lew said.
The risk of collisions spikes this time of year due to deer and elk migrating to lower elevations, bringing more animals across highways. The end of daylight saving time also plays a role as more drivers navigate roads during the relatively low-visibility hours before and after sunset, when deer often move about.
In Colorado, the 54,189 vehicle-animal collisions that CDOT recorded from 2010 through 2024 caused the deaths of 48 vehicle occupants and more than 5,000 injuries. The animals breakdown: 82% deer, 11% elk, 2% bears.
Ten counties where vehicles hit the most animals during that period included five along the Front Range — Douglas, Jefferson, El Paso, Larimer, and Pueblo — with a combined total of 12,791 collisions, state records show. That compares with 11,068 in the other five counties in western Colorado — La Plata, Montezuma, Garfield, Moffat, and Chaffee.
Colorado lawmakers over the past two decades have directed funds for the installation of more and more wildlife crossings, typically overpasses and underpasses combined with fencing along highways. “These can be up to 90% effective in reducing collisions,” Environment America researcher Rachel Jaeger said.
Most recently, in 2022, lawmakers set up a wildlife safe passage fund with a $5.5 million investment for crossing construction. That money’s been spent. State transportation planners have identified locations where crossings are needed, such as the stretch of U.S. 40 between the intersection with I-70 and the town of Empire, where bighorn sheep live.
Wildlife-vehicle collisions have proved persistent enough that safety advocates have launched a social media campaign and are mulling new strategies, such as promoting ridership on CDOT’s intercity Bustang buses as an animal-friendly way to move.
“Leave your driving to a professional,” said Danny Katz, director of the Colorado Public Interest Research Group. “Just take public transportation.”
Get more Colorado news by signing up for our Mile High Roundup email newsletter.
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Technically, we’ll gain an extra hour of sleep when Daylight Saving Time ends on November 2, and clocks “fall back.” But that time change can still throw off your sleep, leaving you feeling groggy and sluggish.
Technically, you gain an extra hour of sleep when daylight saving time ends on Nov. 2, and clocks “fall back.” But that time change can still throw off your sleep, leaving you feeling groggy and sluggish.
“In theory, getting an extra hour of sleep sounds great, but it can disrupt your circadian rhythm,” said Dr. Keisha Sullivan, a sleep medicine specialist with Kaiser Permanente.
She offered several tips for maintaining good sleep hygiene, including keeping a consistent bedtime even on weekends, avoiding caffeine six hours before going to bed, stopping the use of electronics one to two hours before bedtime, and trying not to eat three to four hours before sleeping. She said the biggest mistake people make is sleep procrastination.
“You want to binge TV or surf the internet, and then you kind of get into a rabbit hole,” Sullivan said. “Set an alarm and remind yourself, ‘Alright, I need to start preparing for bedtime.’”
Getting enough REM and deep sleep throughout the night is essential. Not sleeping enough can impact your health in many ways, including memory loss, weight gain, and increased food cravings.
“REM sleep is when memory consolidation occurs, and deep sleep is when hormone balance and healing happen,” she explained.
Sullivan said insomnia complaints tend to peak this time of year for several reasons, including less physical activity and holiday stress. She recommends using sunlight as a natural cue for when to go to sleep and when to wake up.
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Linh Bui
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Arizona is unique in so many ways. It’s uniquely hot and uniquely dry…
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Morgan Fischer
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That’s what an increasing number of medical doctors are saying, basing this on what they say is scientific evidence that the annual switch in hours extracts a heavy toll on the human body. Of course, many of us already knew that.
“Quite honestly, there is no benefit,” said Dr. Jairo Hernando Barrantes Perez, assistant professor of Pulmonary and Sleep Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine. “It is better for your body to keep the same circadian rhythm year round.”
Many people say just pick one or the other — standard time or Daylight Saving Time — and stick to that year round. But sleep researchers disagree.
Perez said those in the field of study support a permanent change to standard time because it aligns more with humans’ circadian rhythm. He’s a member of The American Academy of Sleep Medicine which has adopted this stance alongside other organizations, such as the Society for Research on Biological Rhythms.
Dr. Kristin Eckel-Mahan, sleep researcher with UTHealth Houston, said the switch is particularly detrimental to those with a later chronotype, usually night owls who prefer staying up into the late night hours.
Adolescents typically fall into the category of having a natural inclination to go to bed later, more than middle or elementary school-aged children, she said. However, those with this chronotype can vary in age from individual to individual.
“For night owls who are already sort of habitually staying up late looking at tablets, TV or some type of stimulation that involves blue light, melatonin [sleep hormone] is already not secreting normally,” Eckel-Mahan said. “It’s delayed substantially—an hour more than it used to be—and they have a really hard time getting up in the morning because it’s even darker.”
Since 2007, residents in the United States have set their clocks an hour ahead in mid-March and prepared to lose an hour of sleep — marking the annual switch to daylight saving time.
This transition from standard time in the fall has existed for many years despite debate on when and for how long. However, in recent years, there’s been a growing push by lawmakers to abolish it altogether and adopt daylight saving time year round, permanently.
In 2022, The U.S. Senate passed the Sunshine Protection Act, which would have ended the biannual switch and implemented perennial daylight saving time. The legislation stalled, but it was reintroduced the following year.
Texas, along with 47 other states, abides by the transition. Arizona—excluding the Navajo Nation—and Hawaii do not participate in the switch. Individual states cannot choose to adopt permanent daylight saving time, but they can opt to eliminate any clock change. According to reports, nearly a dozen states have considered such legislation.
According to Perez, the initial reason to implement daylight saving time in the U.S. was to save on electrical energy. But now, this energy is widely accessible, and research has shown that energy expenditures in most countries that switch clocks do not change significantly.
“Unfortunately, this has been a political and economic issue for years,” Perez said. “It might’ve been better for the part of the country where the morning is too dark and too dangerous to be outside.”
“Now, multiple arguments go back and forth, but if you look at how much energy or how much money you’re saving, it’s not doing much,” he added. “If you take into account the costs of taking care of the health complications and the extra police that are deployed [some studies indicate crime and motor vehicle accidents rise during the switch], the benefit gets voided.”
The biannual switch can disrupt individuals’ sleep patterns, increase symptoms related to anxiety and depression, and affect moods and hormone production. Research indicates that the transition in the spring particularly increases the risks for heart attacks and strokes.
Although it typically takes one to two weeks for someone to adjust, Eckel-Mahan added that evidence when evaluating individuals’ cortisol levels—a hormone related to stress that assists with getting up and remaining awake—indicates that some people never fully adjust to daylight saving time because their internal body clock is misaligned with the solar clock.
“Some people adjust better than others, that is true,” Eckel-Mahan said. “But, not everybody is capable.”
According to Eckel-Mahan, studies have also shown that humans have a slightly longer circadian period than 24 hours, but the solar clock keeps individuals on a 24-hour schedule. This means that the phase delay in the fall aligns more with the body’s natural rhythms.
She said that those struggling with the transition can adhere to the solar clock, limit their exposure to blue light late at night, soak up as much sunlight during the daylight hours and avoid eating and exercising close to bedtime to help ease the change.
According to Perez, those most affected by the transition include women of reproductive ages and children. He pointed out that the research evaluating the uptick in heart attacks in the days after switching to daylight saving time showcases that they are occurring in women more than they are men.
Perez said researchers have seen that kids are very sensitive to the change and may sleep through the first few hours of school, disrupting their academic and social performance. He added that it is common for people to experience circadian misalignment and “social jet lag.” According to the National Institutes of Health, circadian misalignment is the inappropriate timing of sleeping, waking and feeding patterns or other central and peripheral rhythms.
Perez cautioned those who are sleep-deprived and want to overcompensate by over-caffeinating that an increase in the consumption of coffee or energy drinks could lead to experiencing high blood pressure, higher cortisol levels or a heightened risk of cardiovascular problems.
He also advised people who may opt to take melatonin to be aware and not overdose on the hormone, “I have patients that come to me, and they’re taking 20 milligrams. That’s way too much.”
Instead, Perez recommends one to three milligrams, five milligrams maximum and the lowest dosages for children as their brains are not prepared for anything higher.
Perez has been a part of the Public Safety Committee of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine for three years. He says despite advocating against the transition to year-long daylight saving time since joining, support for this stance hasn’t garnered traction.
“Unfortunately, it hasn’t taken off or gained enough weight in Congress to pass a law to abolish it,” Perez said. “We were close a couple years ago, and we are trying to move forward this year again to do it, but people have to be aware that the benefit that was present 200 years ago is not present any longer.”
“We weren’t aware of circadian rhythm then. We didn’t have as much information as we do nowadays,” he added. “We weren’t aware because we were not keeping statistics as close as we are nowadays. So now, we have evidence that it doesn’t help as much. It’s just a lack of knowledge from the general public.”
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Faith Bugenhagen
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Daylight saving time for 2024 starts this weekend, taking an hour from many sleep schedules as the clocks spring forward.
In the early morning of Sunday, March 10, the time change takes effect. This will give most Americans an extra hour of sunlight until the clocks fall back again in the autumn.
Here’s everything to know about the time change.
The time will change at 2 a.m. on Sunday, March 10. Daylight saving time always begins on the second Sunday of March, and ends on the first Sunday of November.
Daylight saving time will be in effect until Nov. 3, 2024, when clocks “fall back.”
When the clocks “spring forward,” jumping from 2 a.m. to 3 a.m. on Sunday morning, people in areas that observe daylight saving time will lose an hour.
It means that waking up at, say, 8 a.m. Sunday morning will feel more like 7 a.m.
There are several different stories claiming to explain the founding of daylight saving time. Farmers were credited with beginning the practice so they could have more daylight hours — but they didn’t actually support daylight saving time when it was adopted. Benjamin Franklin has also been named as a creator of the phenomenon, but that’s based on a satirical essay he wrote in 1784.
As CBS News previously reported, the practice began in 1916. Germany observed daylight saving time that year to conserve fuel, and when the U.S. Embassy in Berlin notified their Washington, D.C. counterparts about the change in time, they noted that Germany believed changing the clocks would save millions of dollars by limiting the use of artificial lights. Other countries in Europe adopted the practice, and in 1918, the U.S. started to use it too.
The story doesn’t end there. In 1919, Congress repealed daylight saving time, even though then-President Woodrow Wilson tried to veto the decision. States were allowed to decide for themselves if they’d continue the practice. In World War II, the country actually observed daylight saving time all year. Congress attempted to do that again in 1974 to save energy, but that effort failed.
It was in 1966 that the Uniform Time Act created the system that we know today. Originally it had daylight saving time beginning in April and ending in October, but later updates established the clocks spring forward the second Sunday in March and fall back the first Sunday in November.
A few states and territories don’t observe daylight saving time. Arizona has not observed daylight saving time since 1968, though the Navajo Nation, which has some land in Arizona, does recognize the time change. Hawaii also doesn’t use daylight saving time, having opted out of it in 1967.
The territories of American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Marina Islands, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands also do not observe daylight saving time.
Outside of the United States, most of the world doesn’t observe daylight saving time. According to the Pew Research Center, only about a third of the world does so. Most of the countries that observe it are in Europe, while a few are in Latin America and the Caribbean. In Africa, Egypt is the only nation to use daylight saving time.
The loss of sleep caused by clocks springing forward has some surprising effects that have led some experts to urge the practice be discontinued.
In 2021, the National Sleep Foundation highlighted the negative effects that daylight saving time has on people’s circadian rhythms. Those disruptions have been linked to a higher number of heart attacks and workplace injuries in the days after a time change.
AAA has warned that less sleep can lead to a heightened risk of car crashes, and recommends that people adjust their sleep schedules to make sure to get seven hours of rest. Disruption of circadian rhythms can also have physical side effects, like an increased risk of ischemic strokes, research from 2016 showed.
There have been pushes to end daylight saving time nationwide, but the practice isn’t likely to end in 2024.
While the Senate passed a bill in 2022 to make daylight saving time permanent and stop the clocks from changing, time ran out to vote on the proposal in the House and it did not become law.
A new version of the bill was introduced in March 2023. That bill remains in committee in both the House and the Senate; that’s the step between a bill being sponsored and a bill being brought before the chamber to be voted on.
In 2022, a CBS News/YouGov poll found that almost 80% of Americans supported changing the current system. The idea of permanently shifting an hour of daylight from the morning to the evening appealed to 46% of Americans.
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As 2024’s daylight saving time starts, most of the U.S. will change the time on clocks — but there are two states and several territories that do not observe daylight saving time.
Come Sunday, people across the country will move clocks forward an hour and lose an hour of sleep. Daylight saving time ends, with clocks moving back an hour, on Nov. 3. The twice annual clock change isn’t observed everywhere in the U.S.
According to the Department of Transportation, which oversees the nation’s time zones, there are two states and five U.S. territories that do not observe daylight saving time.
Indiana only adopted daylight saving time beginning in 2006.
Daylight saving time was enacted as a legal requirement by the Uniform Time Act of 1966, according to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics. Under the act, states can exempt themselves from daylight saving time. They do not require permission from the Department of Transportation to opt out from daylight saving time. While states can opt out of observing daylight saving time, they cannot choose to be on permanent daylight saving time.
States also cannot independently change time zones or the length of daylight saving time, which is determined by the federal government.
The states and territories that have chosen to opt out of daylight saving have done so for a variety of reasons.
Arizona made the decision not to observe daylight saving time in 1968, according to the state library.
The state made the decision based on the hotter temperatures and desert climate in Arizona, CBS affiliate KOLD reported.
When the clocks spring forward, sunset is an hour later. That would keep people in the state out later during hot months.
It also affects energy costs, KOLD reported.
“The reason for this is the longer the sun was up at night when everyone was home, the more energy households would use during the hot summers,” according to KOLD.
Arizona Rep. Debbie Lesko addressed the issue in a 2022 Congressional hearing.
“In Arizona it is very hot in the summer. In fact, a lot of our workers that work on rooftops, doing new roofs, or on the highways, they actually work in the middle of the night, because it is just too hot,” Lesko said. “And so any time you change anything to Arizona, Arizonans are going to be upset, and it will have consequences that may, that people from the East Coast may not think about.”
The Navajo Nation, which spans parts of Arizona, Utah and New Mexico, does follow daylight saving time.
According to CBS affiliate KGMB, Hawaii’s officials in 1967 determined that the state didn’t need to disrupt its schedules to account for changes in daylight. Hawaii’s proximity to the equator means it gets enough sunlight through the day, regardless of the time of year.
A 2022 CBS News/YouGov poll found that nearly 80% of Americans supported changing the current system. The idea of permanently shifting an hour of daylight from the morning to the evening appealed to 46% of Americans while 33% wanted the clock to run out on daylight saving time.
Given the dislike of time changes, several states across the U.S. have tried to end daylight saving or adopt it permanently.
Colorado in 2022 passed a law calling for year-round daylight saving, but the text of the bill states that daylight saving time would only become adopted year-round if Congress enacted a federal law allowing states to remain on daylight saving time all year.
In Massachusetts, state officials in October heard testimony this October on two bills: one that aims to make daylight saving time permanent and another that would end daylight saving time and restore standard time year-round.
There have also been federal efforts around changing daylight saving. Under a 2022 bill, which stalled in the House, daylight saving time would have been made permanent. The bill was reintroduced in 2023, and is still in committee.
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WASHINGTON — Most of America “springs forward” Sunday for daylight saving time and losing that hour of sleep can do more than leave you tired and cranky the next day. It also could harm your health.
Darker mornings and more evening light together knock your body clock out of whack – which means daylight saving time can usher in sleep trouble for weeks or longer. Studies have even found an uptick in heart attacks and strokes right after the March time change.
(video from 2023 daylight saving time)
There are ways to ease the adjustment, including getting more sunshine to help reset your circadian rhythm for healthful sleep.
“Not unlike when one travels across many time zones, how long it can take is very different for different people,” said Dr. Eduardo Sanchez of the American Heart Association. “Understand that your body is transitioning.”
When does daylight saving time start?
Daylight saving time begins Sunday at 2 a.m., an hour of sleep vanishing in most of the U.S. The ritual will reverse on Nov. 3 when clocks “fall back” as daylight saving time ends.
Hawaii and most of Arizona don’t make the spring switch, sticking to standard time year-round along with Puerto Rico, American Samoa, Guam and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Worldwide, dozens of countries also observe daylight saving time, starting and ending at different dates.
Some people try to prepare for daylight saving time’s sleep jolt by going to bed a little earlier two or three nights ahead. With a third of American adults already not getting the recommended seven hours of nightly shuteye, catching up can be difficult.
What happens to your brain when it’s lighter later?
The brain has a master clock that is set by exposure to sunlight and darkness. This circadian rhythm is a roughly 24-hour cycle that determines when we become sleepy and when we’re more alert. The patterns change with age, one reason that early-to-rise youngsters evolve into hard-to-wake teens.
Morning light resets the rhythm. By evening, levels of a hormone called melatonin begin to surge, triggering drowsiness. Too much light in the evening – that extra hour from daylight saving time – delays that surge and the cycle gets out of sync.
Sleep deprivation is linked to heart disease, cognitive decline, obesity and numerous other problems. And that circadian clock affects more than sleep, also influencing things like heart rate, blood pressure, stress hormones and metabolism.
How does the time change affect your health?
Fatal car crashes temporarily jump the first few days after the spring time change, according to a study of U.S. traffic fatalities. The risk was highest in the morning, and researchers attributed it to sleep deprivation.
Then there’s the cardiac connection. The American Heart Association points to studies that suggest an uptick in heart attacks on the Monday after daylight saving time begins, and in strokes for two days afterward.
Doctors already know that heart attacks, especially severe ones, are a bit more common on Mondays generally – and in the morning, when blood is more clot-prone.
It’s not clear why the time change would add to the Monday connection, Sanchez said, although probably something about the abrupt circadian disruption exacerbates factors such as high blood pressure in people already at risk.
How to prepare for daylight saving time
Go to bed a little earlier Friday and Saturday nights, and try to get more morning light. Moving up daily routines, like dinner time or when you exercise, also may help cue your body to start adapting, sleep experts advise.
Afternoon naps and caffeine as well as evening light from phones and other electronic devices can make adjusting to an earlier bedtime even harder.
Stay tuned: Some health groups, including the American Medical Association and American Academy of Sleep Medicine, have said it’s time to do away with time switches and that sticking with standard time year-round aligns better with the sun – and human biology.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
Copyright © 2024 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
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Collective groans emerge from under comforters each spring with the advent of daylight saving time and the loss of one hour’s sleep.
A recent poll conducted by Monmouth University found that 61% of Americans wanted to get rid of the twice-a-year time change – falling back an hour each November to standard time and springing ahead each March to daylight saving. Just over one-third of people wanted to keep the back-and-forth shifts.
MORE: Drinking coffee could lower risk of obesity, study says
Not only is switching from standard time to daylight saving the second Sunday in March wildly unpopular – it is also dangerous. Studies have shown it leads to increased behavioral health issues, cardiovascular events and traffic fatalities.
“That one-hour change may not seem like much, but it can wreak havoc on people’s mental and physical well-being in the short term,” Dr. Charles Czeisler, a professor of sleep medicine at Harvard Medical School, told Harvard Men’s Health Watch last year.
Pushing clocks ahead an hour increases “our exposure to morning darkness and to artificial light at night,” which disrupts our circadian rhythm, the name for the physical, mental and behavioral changes we experience over a 24-hour period, said Dr. Zhikui Wei, a specialist in sleep medicine and neurology at Thomas Jefferson University’s Sleep Disorders Center. It may take “weeks to months to adjust to the lost hour” resulting in “ongoing sleep deficiency.”
The negative health impacts from this disruption range from mood changes to increased risk for suicide and substance abuse.
“It’s definitely not uncommon for patients who struggle with circadian rhythm disorders to struggle with mental health disorders such as depression and anxiety,” Wei said.
People are at higher risk for heart attacks, strokes and traffic accidents in the days following the move to daylight saving time.
Behavioral, learning and attention issues are also common among adolescents who get less sleep. A 2015 study found that students had slower reaction times and were less able to pay attention in school in the days following the spring time change.
These findings are why the “medical community in general has voiced support for permanent standard time,” Wei said.
In 2020, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine published a position paper against the move from standard time to daylight saving time, stating that the “acute transition” leads to serious public health and safety risks.
“Daylight saving time is less aligned with human circadian biology – which, due to the impacts of the delayed natural light/dark cycle on human activity, could result in circadian misalignment, which has been associated in some studies with increased cardiovascular disease risk, metabolic syndrome and other health risks,” the paper reads, ultimately advocating for the move to a fixed, year-round standard time.
Legislation to eliminate the back-and-forth time changes has been languishing in Congress.
Last year, Sen. Marco Rubio, of Florida, reintroduced the bipartisan Sunshine Protection Act in the U.S. Senate. It would create a permanent, national daylight saving time. But the bill, which would generally mean less light in the morning, has stalled.
At this time, federal law still prohibits states from adopting permanent daylight saving time.
Plus, medical experts do not support permanent daylight saving since it causes a “misalignment between social clock and internal circadian rhythm,” Wei said.
“Many people’s circadian rhythms are somewhat resilient, but if you’re going to make a change, it would be much more favorable to go with standard time,” Dr. Patrick J. Strollo Jr., a sleep-apnea researcher and pulmonologist at the University of Pittsburgh, said in a post on the American Medical Association’s website.
When the United States experimented with universal daylight saving time in 1973, during an energy crisis, the sun generally didn’t come up before 8 a.m. across Pennsylvania. Parents objected to their children riding buses back and forth to school in the dark.
The shift to universal daylight saving was so unpopular that Congress halted the plan just 10 months into the experiment.
The tug-of-war time changes began in the early 1900s to preserve energy and resources and to promote commerce. The shifting between standard and daylight saving time started and stopped several times before becoming permanent with the 1966 Uniform Time Act.
What makes these biannual time changes especially unhealthy is that they exacerbate existing problems people have with sleep hygiene, Wei said.
“One of the biggest challenges in modern day is that sometimes there are other priorities that may take the place of sleep,” Wei said. “But from a health perspective and a life perspective, sleep is an essential function.”
Daylight saving time takes effect Sunday at 2 a.m., when clocks move one hour ahead.
To help ease the transition, Wei recommended that people start waking up 15 to 30 minutes earlier each day, starting Thursday. “That way, people may have an easier time adjusting to the earlier schedule,” Wei said.
He also suggested that people prioritize and protect their sleep even more than they normally do by:
• Maintaining a consistent sleep schedule
• Getting 7-9 hours of sleep a night
• Avoiding caffeine, alcohol and smoking
• Reducing exposure to artificial light, such as from electronic devices, at least 30 minutes to one hour before bedtime
• Seeking professional help for any mental health issues, such as anxiety and depression
How do you know if you need to see a sleep specialist?
If you have trouble falling asleep, staying asleep or experience unsatisfying sleep, you might want to talk to a medical provider, Wei said.
Other reasons to think about having a sleep assessment include experiencing mood swings or mood disturbances during the day or suffering from impaired daytime functioning and alertness.
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Gaining an hour of sleep as daylight saving time ends on Nov. 5 might sound like a win, but experts say there are still ways that “falling back” can disrupt our health.
“Despite the gaining or losing an hour, one of the things that we can expect is the light exposure (to change),” explains Blair Steel, a licensed clinical psychologist. “And we know that less morning light can decrease levels of mood-boosting hormones, such as serotonin.”
Being aware of these changes — and taking steps to address their impact — can also help shore up your defenses against the winter blues or seasonal depression, clinically known as seasonal affective disorder, or SAD.
About 3% to 5% of people may develop SAD, says Vanessa Kennedy, director of psychology at Driftwood Recovery, explaining that it typically involves the onset of “depressed mood in the fall or winter seasons when weather conditions become rainy, cold and gloomy for an extended period of time.”
“Reduced hours of sunlight that come along with ending daylight saving time in the fall can exacerbate these symptoms,” she noted.
So how can you cope? Try these tips:
“Even though you may have an extra hour of sleep, it’s important to balance that with having some light in the morning,” Steel suggests. “If you go to work after (the time change), and you come home and you’re driving home in the dark, that can certainly increase depression.”
If your schedule or gloomy weather keeps you from experiencing natural light during your day, consider light-box therapy or special lamps that mimic the sun.
“Indoor light-box devices mimic the effects of natural sunlight, contributing to normalization of hormone and vitamin levels and setting up the right biological factors to improve mood,” Kennedy says.
Or, consider changing up your surroundings temporarily if the weather affects your mood significantly.
“Going to a sunnier, warmer climate for a getaway, or planning to work remotely for fall and winter months if possible can be a way to ward off depression and maintain your happiness,” Kennedy says.
Need another pick-me-up when light is lacking? Try exercise.
“Regular exercise can increase serotonin levels and boost mood,” Kennedy says. “While exercising outdoors may not always be possible during bad weather, exercising indoors or adopting outdoor fall or winter exercises that incorporate nature can be beneficial.”
Kennedy also suggests reframing the meaning of reduced daylight to give it new significance.
“When it gets dark early, you can enjoy different activities, such as movie nights, holiday lights, evening gatherings, s’mores by a fire, stargazing or developing a more thorough winding-down routine before bed,” she says. “When you develop new associations between reduced daylight and positive activities, your mood can benefit.”
For some people, increased light and movement might not be enough to avoid seasonal depression. If this is the case, Steel says you should be aware of some warning signs it may be time to seek professional help.
One common sign is an inability to experience pleasure.
“If there are things that you typically enjoy, and you just aren’t able to feel that same level of joy, whether it’s music or time with friends, that’s definitely a red flag,” she says. This may be coupled with increasing isolation.
“Isolation is something that you see with many kinds of mental health conditions,” she adds. “So if you see if you’re isolating, it’s definitely time to get some help.”
Other signs to look for include a dramatic increase or decrease in appetite or sleep, she says.
If you are feeling depressed as the days grow shorter — or any time of year — there are treatment options, including therapy and antidepressant medications, that may help.
“Talk to your health care provider about which treatment, or combination of treatments, is best for you,” the National Institute of Mental Health advises. It offers some resources on its website for how to find help.
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Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
As entrepreneurs, most of us have traveled across time zones and do so frequently for both work and leisure. And do we complain? So despite knowing that it will happen, why do many of us complain every year when the clocks spring forward by one hour for Daylight Saving Time (DST)?
I encourage you to take a different approach this year. First, the most important thing you can do is to change your attitude towards the clocks springing forward. Here’s how: Mentally prepare yourself in advance, and tell yourself and those around you that DST is nothing to complain about because we face it every year. We’re better off preparing for it and finding the silver linings and benefits of the time change.
For example, more daylight in the evening allows for after-dinner walks. Such a walk fosters family time, lowers your blood glucose level, and it’s likely a deterrent from excess evening snacking or drinking. Is that a win or a win?
I recall weekday mornings from past DST days when everyone in my house was slow to move, and nobody except for the clocks was springing forward. Friends called me to talk about their double doses of caffeine and how they yelled more at their kids to rush them out the door for school.
Research shows increased car accidents and injuries at work after DST because our already sleep-deprived country is less alert. So, while we will still feel the time change because of our circadian rhythm, the 24-hour cycle that’s governed by our body’s internal clock, below are some tips that should help make DST more manageable and help you better prepare not to fall back when the clock springs forward.
Related: How Daylight Savings Time Affects Productivity
You may not feel tired at night but try to schedule an earlier bedtime before DST. By moderately making these changes before the time change, you’ll begin daylight saving time having almost adapted to the time change.
From exercise to meals to your bedtime routine, move everything forward by 15 minutes each day. Particularly in the evening, be disciplined about washing your face, brushing your teeth, going off screens or whatever sleep routines you have earlier than normal.
I’ve never used the snooze button. I feel it’s torture and not efficient nor motivating for the morning routine you’ve set out to do, so I mentally trained myself never to snooze. Now for you snoozers, you can call me crazy but give yourself some wiggle room during the week of DST for the morning time. Most of us adjusting to the time change will be slow-moving, and rushing will lead to a stressful morning, so use the extra time to prevent this rushed and chaotic feeling.
The same goes for getting kids ready for school. Time is valuable, and the extra time will make the morning less hectic. Just please do not “snooze,” as this will keep your circadian rhythm from adjusting to the time change.
Related: Stop Hitting the Snooze Button and Start Intentionally Building Your Life and Business
Get your sunshine early, within an hour of waking if you can, even if it’s stepping outdoors for a 5-minute gratitude practice, walking the dog or looking towards the light of the day while taking deep breaths. Light is the central driver of our circadian rhythm, and this morning sunlight alone will help your body’s internal clock best acclimate to the new timing of light and dark.
I’m not a biohacker, but I do keep on top of the latest research and science in health and wellness, and I encourage you to check out this guide from Neuroscience Professor at Stanford, Dr. Andrew Huberman. Even on a cloudy day, natural light provides more brightness that helps to align the circadian rhythm than artificial indoor lighting.
Related: 6 Benefits of Unchaining Yourself From Your Desk to Take a Break Outside
I personally look forward to and need my morning workouts as they help get my body, brain and soul moving and kickstart my day. But if exercising first thing in the morning isn’t what you enjoy, plan to get outside or move every day this week, even if just a brisk mid-morning or lunchtime walk (or even a ‘sweatwork’ walk meeting), which will energize all parties involved and help everyone ease into a better night of sleep.
Added bonus? Walking as little as 2 to 5 minutes after any meal will help lower your blood glucose level, according to a 2022 study in the Journal of Sports Medicine.
Proper nutrition is directly correlated to sleep. Eliminate added sugars, stay well hydrated with water and electrolytes and focus on eating good sources of protein, carbs and fat, such as fish high in omega 3s, nuts, vegetables and fruits. Eat dinner at least a few hours before bed, and limit spicy and heavy foods.
Whenever my schedule allows, I prefer to eat what I call “linner,” meaning that it’s a combo lunch/dinner, and I eat this meal between 3-4 p.m. If this isn’t conducive to your schedule or ability to prepare a healthy meal, try making lunch the bigger meal of your day. Be aware of caffeine in beverages, including soda which is also loaded with sugar.
It’s human and forgivable that most people will be doubling and even tripling up their coffee and green tea this week just to survive. But don’t overdo it. Too much caffeine will make you crash, so aim to stop drinking caffeine after 2 p.m. And particularly for this week, plan to ease up on alcohol intake as alcohol can interfere with a good night’s sleep.
Related: Is Caffeine Boosting or Sabotaging Your Productivity?
If your boss is flexible, ask if you can get to the office a little later for a couple of days so you can take the time to happily ease into the time change and avoid sleep-deprived and frustrated commuters at rush hour.
If you lead a team or company, have a little compassion. Offer your team a slightly later start to the morning in exchange for meeting a specific deadline that week or having them agree to 15–30 minutes of fresh air early in the morning or the middle of the day. Happy employees = productive employees.
More health and wellness professionals, experts and entrepreneurs are treating themselves to power naps for rejuvenation and mental wellness. The key for napping is 30 minutes or less; otherwise, you’ll feel like you got hit by a bus when you wake up! A nap should both calm your nervous system and energize you.
Early afternoon naps are best, as naps late in the day can make it difficult to sleep. Not necessary, but if you’re curious about prioritizing a deeper night’s sleep, look into sleep tools such as weighted blankets, sleep meditation apps and light therapy.
With these tips, you should be able to spring forward along with the clocks. As human beings, and especially as entrepreneurs, we are strong, and our minds and bodies can adjust. So when the clocks spring forward, shift your mindset to when the alarm goes off at 6 a.m. on Monday morning, and think that it’s 6 a.m. instead of saying, “I can’t believe it’s really 5 a.m.!” The better we prepare, the better we position ourselves for positive outcomes and longer, brighter days full of sunshine.
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Elisette Carlson
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CNN
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It’s almost time for clocks to “spring forward” one hour.
On the second Sunday of March, at 2 a.m., clocks in most of the United States and many other countries move forward one hour and stay there for nearly eight months in what is called Daylight Saving Time. On the first Sunday of November, at 2 a.m., clocks fall back an hour to standard time.
The current March to November system that the US follows began in 2007, but the concept of “saving daylight” is much older. Daylight Saving Time has its roots in train schedules, but it was put into practice in Europe and the United States to save fuel and power during World War I, according to the US Department of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics.
Pro tip: It’s Daylight Saving Time, with singular use of “saving,” not “savings.”
The US kept Daylight Saving Time permanent during most of World War II. The idea was put in place to conserve fuel and keep things standard. As the war came to a close in 1945, Gallup asked respondents how we should tell time. Only 17% wanted to keep what was then called “war time” all year.
During the energy crisis of the 1970s, we tried permanent Daylight Saving Time again in the winter of 1973-1974. The idea again was to conserve fuel. It was a popular move at the time when President Richard Nixon signed the law in January 1974. But by the end of the month, Florida’s governor had called for the law’s repeal after eight schoolchildren were hit by cars in the dark. Schools across the country delayed start times until the sun came up.

Daylight savings time ends: 2 men, 2,000 clocks and 48 hours to change them all
By summer, public approval had plummeted, and in early October Congress voted to switch back to standard time.
In the US, states are not required by law to “fall back” or “spring forward.” Hawaii and most of Arizona do not observe Daylight Saving Time. The twice-yearly switcheroo is irritating enough to lawmakers of all political stripes that the US Senate passed legislation in March 2022 to make Daylight Saving Time permanent. It passed by unanimous consent. The bill would need to pass the House of Representatives and be signed by President Joe Biden to become law.
Studies over the last 25 years have shown the one-hour change disrupts body rhythms tuned to Earth’s rotation, adding fuel to the debate over whether having Daylight Saving Time in any form is a good idea.
The issue is that for every argument there is a counterargument. There are studies, for example, that show we have more car accidents when people lose an extra hour of sleep. There are also studies that show robberies decline when there is an extra hour of sunlight at the end of the day. We also know that people suffer more heart attacks at the start of Daylight Saving Time. But what about our mental health? People seem to be happier when there is an extra hour of daylight.
Of course, there’s the economy, which pays for all that outdoor fun in the sun. Although saving energy was often put out as a reason to have Daylight Saving Time, the energy saved isn’t much — if anything at all.
Instead, the lobbying effort for Daylight Saving Time came mostly from different sectors of the economy. In the mid-20th century, lobby groups for the recreational sports industry (think driving ranges) wanted more customers to come out after a day at the office. It’s easier to do so when there is more light at the end of the day.
But the movie industry didn’t like Daylight Saving Time. You’re less likely to go to a movie when it’s bright outside. Despite the myth, farmers didn’t like it either because it made it difficult to get their food to the market in the morning.
The bottom line: It’s not clear whether having that extra hour of sunlight at the end of the day versus the beginning is helpful. It just depends on who you are and what you want. And it doesn’t look like Daylight Saving Time in the US is going away anytime soon.
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It’s that time of year again, when most of the U.S. will enjoy an extra hour of sleep as clocks fall back at 2 a.m. Sunday. But there’s growing momentum to make the twice-yearly tradition a thing of the past.
A CBS News/YouGov poll conducted in March found that nearly eight in 10 Americans want to stop changing their clocks twice a year.
Brandi Alexander, whose daughter boards the school bus when it’s dark, is among them.
“It’s a concern with her crossing the street, cars can’t see her and other children crossing the street,” Alexander said.
Every March, clocks spring forward to daylight saving time. Every November, they fall back to standard time. Research has shown that changing the clocks impacts productivity and mental and physical health.
Earlier this year, the Senate passed the Sunshine Protection Act, making daylight saving time permanent. But the bill has been stalled in the House.
If daylight saving time becomes permanent, the sun wouldn’t rise until after 9 a.m. come January in Detroit, Michigan. That means people will be getting to work and shuttling kids to school in the dark.
Jane Terry, vice president of government affairs at the National Safety Council, which supports ending the time changing ritual but sticking to standard time, says “it really messes with our internal systems.”
“Our body rhythm is aligned with the sun, and that is standard time — what we’re going to go back to this weekend,” Terry said.
Nearly every state has proposed or passed legislation to do away with the time rotating ritual. But for now, most states will have to keep changing clocks until Congress changes its mind.
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Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are getting behind a bill that would impact every resident in the U.S.: A permanent switch to daylight saving time beginning in November 2023. Aside from avoiding the nuisance — and sleep deprivation — of changing clocks twice a year, the effort could give the economy a boost, lawmakers say.
The Sunshine Protection Act should boost consumer spending and shift energy consumption by giving Americans an extra hour of sunlight at the end of the workday, the lawmakers said in a release about the bill. Passage of the bill could “jump-start” the economy and effectively act as a “stimulus package all on its own,” wrote Sam Lyman, policy director of the Orrin G. Hatch Foundation, in an op-ed in The Hill.
But the economic benefits of year-round DST may be murkier than its supporters suggest, according to PNC economist Kurt Rankin, who looked into studies about time shifts and their impact on the economy. First off, there’s not much available research on the issue, at least when compared with other aspects of the economy such as wages or inflation. And the existing research is limited in scope, raising questions about what the national economic impact would be.
“From an economist perspective, I think the benefits will be minimal,” Rankin told CBS MoneyWatch. “It’s not something that is going to cure the woes that are facing the U.S. economy over the next year or two — the inflation concerns, rising interest rates, the supply chain shortages.”
One finding often cited as evidence of the economic benefits of the switch comes from the JP Morgan Chase Institute, which in 2016 found that consumer spending dropped 3.5% after the end of daylight saving time in November. That suggests some consumers pare their spending when there’s one less hour of daylight at the end of the day for them to shop or do errands.
But the Chase Institute study focused on spending in Los Angeles, a relatively limited scope. And the researchers noted that other policy changes, such as a sales tax holiday, could provide a larger boost to consumer spending.
Some business groups say they are studying the issue. The National Retail Federation in an email said it has “historically supported daylight saving time, but that position does not reflect the current debate over creating permanent daylight saving time, which was passed by the Senate this week.”
It added, “We are examining the implications of this change and consulting with our members.”
That being said, Rankin believed the switch to permanent DST could benefit one sector of the economy: Hospitality businesses like restaurants and hotels. More daylight toward the end of the day could boost demand for those services, which would help those businesses as well as gig economy workers like DoorDash drivers.
“That is the sector that is still having the most difficulty bouncing back from the pandemic, so giving some security to workers in that sector will be helpful,” he said.
Rankin added that he himself likes the idea of a permanent switch, even if he doesn’t see much of an economic case for the bill. “I’m in favor of getting rid of changing the clocks because it throws off your schedule,” he said days after clocks were spun forward one hour on March 13. “I’ve been eating dinner an hour and a half late the last week, as I try to adjust.”
The research findings on energy savings — one of the primary reasons supporters suggest making daylight saving time permanent — is mixed. A 2008 Department of Energy study found that there was a savings of 0.5% in electricity per day in the four weeks after the nation extended daylight saving time in 2005.
Yale University researchers in a 2011 paper found that daylight saving time actually increased energy consumption in Indiana because higher heating and cooling costs outpaced lower demand for electrical lighting. The researchers wrote, “We find that the long-standing rationale for DST is questionable.”
But that paper is based on energy consumption in one state — once again, a small section of the U.S. — and might not be applicable more broadly.
The bill, which was approved unanimously by the Senate on Tuesday, must now be approved by the House and signed by the president to become law.
At a House Energy Subcommittee on Consumer Protection hearing on March 9, experts urged lawmakers to make the change, citing issues such as safety and an increase in traffic accidents when commuters are traveling during darkness.
“Simply put, darkness kills. And darkness in the evening is far deadlier than darkness in the morning,” University of Washington professor Steve P. Calandrillo told the committee.
Americans themselves are divided on the issue, according to polls. About 3 in 10 people said they would like to have daylight saving time all year round, while an equal number said they’d prefer to keep the current system of falling back an hour in November and springing forward an hour in March, an AP-NORC poll found in 2019. The remaining 4 in 10 people said they wanted to switch to standard time all year.
In the end, the rationale for switching to permanent daylight savings time may come down to personal preference, not economics. As JPMorgan Chase put it: Americans “may simply enjoy having the additional daylight.”
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Press Release
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updated: Nov 1, 2017
MILWAUKEE, November 1, 2017 (Newswire.com)
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When tens of millions of Americans commute home after work next week, there won’t be a wink of sunlight in the sky for most of the nation. A national poll, conducted by EndDaylightSavingTime.org, was taken to see if Daylight Saving Time (DST) still makes sense in a modern society.
“We decided to see how the nation felt about that,” said Anthony Boldin, founder of EndDaylightSavingTime.org, the organization responsible for the poll.
84 percent was quite a surprise. The American people are saying loud and clear, ‘We don’t like turning the clocks back.’
Anthony Boldin, Founder
It is natural to assume that many people would prefer having more sun and later evenings. What was surprising, however, was just how strong this sentiment was.
“84 percent was quite a surprise,” said Boldin, “The American people are saying loud and clear, ‘We don’t like turning the clocks back.’”
The poll of 1,147 adults — which had a margin of error of 4 percent — was conducted across the U.S. Sunday, Oct. 29 through Tuesday, Oct. 31.
Out of the 84 percent of people who indicated they “like” the idea of more light in the evenings, 65 percent said they “Very Strongly Agree” or “Strongly Agree” that longer days are preferable. Only 16 percent of respondents were against the idea of later evenings.
According to Boldin, “There is a growing library of research that has been showing the problems early sunsets have on everyday Americans.” If Daylight Saving Time was replaced with one later time all year round, there could be the many benefits.
You can read respondents’ responses to the poll here.
About EndDaylightSavingTime.org
Anthony Boldin, the founder of EndDaylightSavingTime.org, is on a mission to educate the public about Daylight Saving Time (DST). Although there are some benefits to DST, Boldin believes the negatives far outweigh the positives, and if you believe in something, you should do something about it. By simply ending Daylight Saving Time and keeping the summer sunset all year round, peoples’ lives will be a little better; days will be a little brighter and lives will be a little safer. If you’re one of the tens of millions of Americans who wants to do away with Daylight Saving Time, please sign our petition.
Source: EndDaylightSavingTime.org
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