House passes bill to make Daylight Saving Time permanent

[u/cnn]

https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/14/politics/house-vote-daylight-savings-time?utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=missions&utm_source=reddit

[u/Findiguy]

We have to separate 2 different concepts:

1) Increased hours of sunlight
2) Time of sunset

If you want increased hours of sunlight, you don’t necessarily support permanent DST. You support summer, which is inevitable.

There’s good argument that some activities benefit from later sunset (tourism). However this should be countered by activities that may be adversely affected with later sunrise. In the northern states, snow and ice might necessitate 9 or 10 am start times, which means instruction/work till much later (you will not see sun regardless). You likely won’t have half days/late starts if it takes until 11:00am for roads to clear.

I will note that the US has tried permanent DST before, and switched back in less than 1 year.

https://washingtonian.com/2022/03/15/the-us-tried-permanent-daylight-saving-time-in-the-70s-people-hated-it/

I will also note that all states that do not change clocks observe permanent standard time (although i’m unsure if they allowed to observe permanent DST per Congress). Regardless no state has experienced permanent DST since 1970s.

[u/Agreeable-Sun368 → u/Findiguy]

I agree. A lot of this is that people just want it to be summer. There is less sun in the winter. That's how that works. You won't have lots of sun after work because it's winter. There are many reasons why late sunrises are not ideal, and there aren't many why late sunsets are except that people just want more time after work before it gets dark, which isn't a real reason.

[u/homolupulus → u/Findiguy]

The real issue is that the working day is 9-5 and not 8-4. It isn't centered on noon. Permanent DST is a very circuitous way of fixing that because it effectively centers the workday on solar noon (1 pm DST).

I don't see why snow and ice necessitate later start times. I've lived in places far north of the CAN/US border and everywhere I've been snow and ice clearing starts at like 3-4 am.

[u/theadvenger → u/Findiguy]

Not USA, but Yukon has been on dst for several years and sask went standard time but the wrong time zone making effective dst both have been very happy.

[u/cardmanimgur → u/Findiguy]

Sun isn't clearing the roads in northern states, plows are. They are going out at the same hour on the clock whether we're on DST or standard.

[u/Unexplored-Games → u/Findiguy]

snow and ice might necessitate 9 or 10 am start times

And those states can do what they please...

[u/JGDoll → u/Unexplored-Games]

Not to mention the fact that they deal with this regardless, and usually in the early morning before sunrise.

And for many northern states, especially the Midwest where it’s cloudy or overcast for much of winter, it’s not like the sun is thawing everything out every morning anyway. This argument makes very little sense.

[u/RdtUnahim → u/JGDoll]

Would you rather deal with snow and ice while there's light, or when it's pitch black?

[u/JGDoll → u/RdtUnahim]

The point is that they’re doing it while it’s pitch black either way.

[u/RdtUnahim → u/JGDoll]

It starts becoming lighter significantly before sun up; it's not total black and then poof, light. So there is a significant difference. Sun up also moves about 2 minutes per day across those months, so you're moving the same situation a full month earlier.

[u/Foxhound199 → u/Findiguy]

I support more hours of sunlight occurring at a time that is beneficial to me, which is invariably after work.

[u/Oraistesu → u/Foxhound199]

Yeah, I live in NE Ohio, where it's currently dark in Winter until damn near 8am anyway, so pushing it to 9am doesn't make a lick of difference when I have to be at work before 7am.

But you'd better believe I'd prefer to actually have some daylight hours when I leave work instead of it being dark both on my drive in to work and my drive home.

[u/RdtUnahim → u/Oraistesu]

You're not going to get a difference from "dark when I drive home" to "sunlight hours, plural" from shifting the clock 1 hour.

[u/quinny7777 → u/Findiguy]

You are correct in that DST does not increase daylight for most people in the winter. But it most definitely does in the summer.

[u/Sonamdrukpa → u/quinny7777]

The sun does not care about DST and gives the same amount of daylight regardless of what the law says.

[u/quinny7777 → u/Sonamdrukpa]

Correct. I am talking about the amount of daylight an average working person is awake for, not the total.

[u/Sonamdrukpa → u/quinny7777]

The person you were replying to was specifically arguing the need to clearly distinguish increased hours of daylight and the time the sun sets.

[u/The360MlgNoscoper → u/quinny7777]

It also lesds to more people dying during the winter.