Many Americans are beginning to question the value of daylight savings. Every March each American family must push the clocks forward one hour in order to save energy and money. The practice has been in effect since times of World War I. In recent years people don’t see the point of it anymore. The move throws off their sleep schedule by an entire hour which could take weeks to readjust. If your sleep schedule is thrown off it is hard for you to function throughout the day because your body is forced to get up before your mind is accustomed.

The recent uproar from the public has caused researchers to take an interest in the topic. A recent study of daylight savings shows the practice has a net savings of 1.3 terawatt hours concerning electricity and lighting. Other surveys show this savings is cancelled out by increased demand for heating and cooling. This occurrence happened first hand to residents of Indiana in 2006 when they first implemented daylight savings statewide. The extra daylight time led to a 1 percent overall rise in residential electricity use, costing the state an extra $9 million. Also in “California, the state Energy Commission resource economist Adrienne Kandel and her colleagues discovered that extending daylight time had little to no effect on energy use in the state. The observed drop in energy use of 0.2 percent fell within the statistical margin of error of 1.5 percent.” (Choi)

Ultimately the counterproductive numbers cannot be ignored. If daylight savings was saving adequate energy and money then it wouldn’t be a problem. More and more studies are coming about proving the opposite. As a hard working American, can you honestly say this is something you want to keep participating in?