As daylight saving time ends this weekend a few things happen. We’ll have once again decided that there are 25 hours in a day. It’ll be dark around six. Florida will lose billions of dollars. There’s a funny thing about the Sunshine state going dark so early. Much less economic activity. And for what exactly?
In 2017, the most comprehensive study of the energy savings related to time changes took place. The study utilized data from 44 individual studies and found the average energy savings is 0.3%. What’s more is that as we continue to become more energy efficient that number will continue to drop. Compare that with the negative economic impact of the time change, which using JP Morgan data from 2017 and calculating the impact based on Florida’s current economy, suggests we lose between $12 to $26 billion annually due to the change. In other words, if the argument is an energy/economic argument, it’s is now firmly against exiting Daylight-Saving Time and will only continue to grow over time. There’s even a health component to it. In the first two days after entering Daylight Saving Time, stroke and heart attack risks rise by 10%. Meaning it'll happen again next spring.
Simply put, there’s no intelligent argument for artificially determining that one day a year should be 23 hours and another, 25. But here we are. Senator Marco Rubio agrees, earlier this week he said, "It’s my hope that Sunday, Nov. 3rd will be the last time that we have to do this ridiculous changing of the clocks back and forth. It makes absolutely no sense, there’s no justification for it".
Additionally, Senator Rick Scott told me when asked earlier this week that we need to contact all of our Congressional Representatives to let them know we need this passed. Now, Senators Scott and Rubio have already sponsored the Sunshine Protection Act in the Senate hopefully putting an end to this nonsense. We all need to make noise with our House Representatives if we’re to move the needle.
We’re literally hurting our economy and our health for no good reason. I’m with Senator Rubio, let’s make this the last time we play this game.
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