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What is the reason for Daylight Saving Time?

How did Daylight Saving Time (DST) getting started? What is the purpose of Daylight Saving Time?


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Daylight Saving Time is observed by around 70 countries in the world. The primary reasons for practicing Daylight Saving Time are to reduce energy consumption and to increase daytime hours for increased productivity and leisure.

There were a lot of people involved in making this practice happen. But just like any other new event, Daylight Saving Time didn’t succeed at first. The first person to introduce the idea to adjust the time one hour back was none other than Benjamin Franklin in 1784. In his proposition, he said that sleeping early and waking up early reduces energy consumption and makes people productive and wealthy. Unfortunately, it took more than 100 years before the actual proposal of the Daylight Saving Time idea to emerge. It was William Willet, a British man who thought of changing it in 1907. He wrote a pamphlet entitled “Waste of Daylight” where it discusses his concerns for energy consumption and productivity that comes along with the practice. Unfortunately, he didn’t live long enough to see his dreams come true. He died on 1915.

Daylight Saving Time started during the World War 1. During this era, energy and resources are very important and the idea of the practice was enticing. In 1916, Germany and Austria were the first countries to practice Daylight Saving Time. Many European countries followed right after. The following year, Australia and Newfoundland started the practice with United States as the latest to follow Daylight Saving Time on 1918. People still need to adjust to the new practice and often times it was not done regularly, not until the declaration of a national law during the World War II.

There were a lot of issues this practice faced years ago. Aside from confusion, there were major problems that happened between 1945 and 1966 even though the US did its best to standardized time. Agencies and firms that depend on the standard national time experienced drawbacks. To prevent these problems from happening, the United States drafted and passed a law called Uniform Time Act of 1966 which states that the daylight Saving time should be mandated and standardized in all the states. However, those states that do not wish to observe the practice are required to send their law. Because of this act, the problems brought upon by the practice are resolved. Now, with the Daylight Saving Time, energy consumption is markedly decreased since then.
Oct 24th, 2012 at 4:09 AM
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