Is this the end of Daylight Saving Time? The majority of U.S. adults want to get rid of it

Around seven in ten Americans want to ditch the biannual changing of the clocks, a new poll has found, with around half of those canvassed keen to eliminate Daylight Saving Time in favor of year-round Standard Time.

The publication of the survey’s findings comes shortly before most residents of the United States moved their clocks forward by an hour at 2 a.m. on Sunday, March 9, in the process shifting from Standard Time to Daylight Saving Time.

Minority in U.S. want Daylight Saving Time

Carried out by pollsters Gallup in late January, the newly released survey found that 72 percent of U.S. adults want to eliminate the current “spring forward, fall back” practice of switching the clocks by an hour in March and November.

And 48 percent of those surveyed advocated keeping Standard Time in place throughout the year, compared to the 24 percent that backed permanent Daylight Saving Time.

Only 19 percent of respondents said they were happy to maintain the current arrangement.

When and why was Daylight Saving Time introduced?

Implemented to extend summertime’s longer available natural light later into the day, the annual switch to Daylight Saving Time was first observed in the U.S. during the First World War, as a way of reducing energy costs.

In 1966, Congress then passed legislation that made the practice the nationwide standard. However, states can opt out, meaning that in Hawaii and most of Arizona, year-round Standard Time is observed. The same is true of U.S. territories in the Pacific and the Caribbean, such as Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam and American Samoa.

Daylight Saving Time cons outweigh pros, experts say

Advocates of the March switch to Daylight Saving Time point not only to the energy-bill savings that can be made from later sunsets, but also to advantages such as reduced crime rates. For example, a study at Stanford University’s Institute for Economic Policy Research reported a significant drop in robberies, rapes and murders in the U.S. during the extra daylight gained by the springtime shift.

However, health experts argue that changing the clocks, even by only an hour, can have a negative impact on our sleep patterns that outweighs any other benefits.

The potential damage to our circadian rhythm is particularly pronounced when the clocks go forward, say the Sleep Foundation’s Danielle Pacheco and Dr. Dustin Collier. They add that the knock-on effects of poorer sleep can include “upticks in heart problems, mood disorders, and motor vehicle collisions.”

In 2022, the U.S. Senate passed a bill aimed at ditching the twice-yearly clock change, by implementing Daylight Saving Time all year round.

However, the Sunshine Protection Act did not make it through the House of Representatives - and a group of sleep specialists has warned that an abolition of the time shift should go in the other direction: in favor of Standard Time.

In a position statement published in the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine in 2020, experts at the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) argued that Standard Time’s earlier sunrises and sunsets are a better natural fit for humans.

“Current evidence best supports the adoption of year-round standard time, which aligns best with human circadian biology”, the AASM statement said.

Under permanent Daylight Saving Time, agrees the American Farm Bureau Federation’s Kari Barbic, many people in the U.S. would be left in darkness until too far into the morning.

“If the whole country took on daylight saving time year-round, most Americans wouldn’t see daylight until well after 8 a.m. in January,” Barbic says. “For those who live on the edge of their time zones, like Michigan, that means sunrise after 9 a.m.”

What’s more, in warm-climate states like Arizona, the argument against Daylight Saving Time is that it actually raises energy costs, as people must spend more of the day trying to keep living and working spaces cool.

No, farmers weren’t behind Daylight Savings Time

One section of American society that is particularly opposed to Daylight Saving Time is the agricultural community, given farmers’ typically early start to the working day.

As is explained by Catherine Boeckmann of the Old Farmers’ Almanac, this opposition stretches back to the beginnings of Daylight Savings Time, despite a common misconception that farmers were actually behind its creation.

Shortly after the First World War, a writer in the Literary Digest said, per Boeckmann: “The farmer objects to doing his early chores in the dark merely so that his city brother, who is sound asleep at the time, may enjoy a daylight motor ride at eight in the evening.”

Boeckmann adds that farmers “continue to lobby Congress against the practice, preferring early daylight to tend to their fields.”

“A later sunset doesn’t change when cows need to be milked, when chickens are fed or when crops need to be harvested,” Barbic concurs.

When do the clocks change in the U.S.?

In almost all areas of the U.S., the clocks moved forward by an hour, from Standard Time to Daylight Saving Time, at 2 a.m. this Sunday, March 9, 2025.

Daylight Saving Time will end when the clocks move back an hour at 2 a.m. on Sunday, Nov. 2, 2025.

Related stories

Leisure

People set to profit from $45 million payout

NASA

E.T. phone home: the astronauts are coming back

Get your game on! Whether you’re into NFL touchdowns, NBA buzzer-beaters, world-class soccer goals, or MLB home runs, our app has it all.

Dive into live coverage, expert insights, breaking news, exclusive videos, and more – plus, stay updated on the latest in current affairs and entertainment. Download now for all-access coverage, right at your fingertips – anytime, anywhere.