A few years ago, Bill Griesar, an expert in neuroscience at Portland State University, went to Fort Vancouver High School to teach kids about brains.
But classes started at 7:30 a.m. and were half empty.
鈥淜ids would tell us that they tried to go to bed,鈥� Griesar said. 鈥淏ut that鈥檚 not how the brain is developing. They stare at the ceiling. They鈥檙e awake at one o鈥檆lock in the morning.鈥�
Young people鈥檚 tendency to stay up late has a biological origin, Griesar said. The teen years are when children begin to separate from parents in preparation for establishing their own adult lives. And what better way to pull away from your parents than by being awake at different times?
Griesar brought research on the topic to the , and district leaders ended up shifting start times to 8:30 a.m. Griesar tells the story to illustrate how important natural circadian rhythms are to health and well-being.
鈥淭ime change is bad for us,鈥� he said.
A found a 6% increase in fatal accidents after daylight saving changes.
Moving our clocks one hour forward or backward, as we all did Sunday morning, increases the risk of and workplace accidents. It can even disrupt farming as crops and animals rely on sunlight to regulate their eating and sleeping.
Over the last few years, lawmakers in states across the country have proposed time-change legislation. A in the most recent legislative session. Another in Washington passed in 2019 and was
But politicians in Washington and many other states made a key misstep in their legislative efforts to make time simpler: They chose to jump forward to permanent daylight saving time, which the . If they鈥檇 chosen to remain on standard time instead, no federal permission would be necessary.
Jay Pea, the president of the nonprofit group , says businesses favor daylight savings because they think it鈥檚 better for the economy.
鈥淭he whole thing was cooked up as a way to increase shopping,鈥� Pea said. 鈥淭hese are shopping malls. These are restaurants, automobile dealerships. Businesses that think that if Americans leave the workplace and see that it鈥檚 still sunny out, that they will go out and go shopping. They鈥檒l go play golf. Whereas if you leave work and it鈥檚 dark, you鈥檙e probably going to go home, make dinner and be with your family.鈥�
Pea is based in Arizona, a state that doesn鈥檛 need extra sunshine and hasn鈥檛 observed daylight saving since 1968. Other sunny jurisdictions like Hawaii, Puerto Rico and Guam also ignore daylight saving.
Pea said computers, flight and train timetables automatically link to the local time zone so there are no real problems. But out-of-state calls can get confusing.
鈥淭here is kind of a brief moment of: 鈥榃hich way is this going now? How did they change their clocks?鈥欌�� he said. 鈥淏ut it鈥檚 not our fault. It鈥檚 the fault of those who are changing their clocks.鈥�
Another quirk of Arizona, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and Guam is that none of their major cities sit on the border of a state that observes daylight saving. Imagine the problems if Portland and Vancouver used different standards to set the time.
Pea thinks the piecemeal approach by states to change their individual time standards is why the effort to end time changes has not been successful so far. He thinks Oregon, Washington and California need to coordinate the change.
Daylight saving time was first introduced in the United States in 1918 to conserve energy during World War I. Extending daylight hours meant people used less energy to light their homes and businesses, so there was more fuel for the war.
Many people think the practice of changing clocks had something to do with kids working on farms. But Pea said that is a myth started in Boston by a newspaper that ran a story listing the reasons for daylight saving time.
鈥淎nd one of them was: 鈥業f we make the farmers harvest crops an hour earlier in the morning, they鈥檒l be fresher.鈥� And of course, the farmers said, 鈥楾hat鈥檚 poppycock! That鈥檚 bizarre!鈥欌�� Pea said.
The ways government-mandated clock changes affect our daily lives are numerous.
Rabbi Motti Wilhelm of the just printed out the prayer schedule for this coming year. The Jewish calendar is based around the phases of the moon and the position of the sun.
Pointing to the longest day of the year, Friday, June 20, Wilhelm pointed out that evening Sabbath starts at 9:03 p.m., pretty late for a service that lasts an hour. He said if Oregon just stuck to standard time, services could start at 8:03 p.m. instead.
鈥淪tandard time all year-round kind of makes sense because that鈥檚 the actual time. The sun is meant to be clear overhead at noon,鈥� Wilhelm said.
Oregon lawmakers will try again next year to get rid of the time change. Meanwhile, enjoy that extra hour in bed on Sunday.
This story comes from the Northwest News Network, a collaboration between public media organizations in Oregon and Washington.
Copyright 2024 Oregon Public Broadcasting
