Jeremy,
Sure did miss the joke. Sorry. When Congress was debating the change date, my neighbor had the same response with her preschooler. She didn’t want to wait in the dark. (I asked her what she did in December when the sun didn’t rise until well after the kids were in school…and what did kids do in Alaska when the sun didn’t rise until 9 or later?)
All northern comments aside, the issue about saving energy with lights was disproved by several univeristy studies. I’m not sure if they’re on the web, but google doesn’t bring it up on the first page search…and I’m more interested in making my tea right now to do a lengthy search.
Denver tried to do a Indiana/Arizona test years ago, and there wasn’t enough proof of savings to justify a change to Central Time.
If we had the population of the 1910s, and majority of us worked 9-5, AND if there was the measurable technology to measure this, then I MIGHT buy off on it. But we are a nation of 300 million and we all work, live, and play on varied schedules.
The basis of inacting the time change was to make it convenient for the factories, specifically for the east. It didn’t have anything to do with helping the workers or anyone else. Once again, large pressure and lobbyists won out.