Most Have No Idea Why We Save Daylight

A U.S. federal law says daylight saving time becomes effective at 2 a.m. on the first Sunday of April -- but most Americans have no idea why.

Michael Downing, author of Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time, says he never gave the time change much thought until it occurred to him he had no idea why he was changing the clock, the Boston Globe reported.

'Most Americans think daylight-saving time benefits farmers or saves energy, but farmers have always hated having to get up earlier and energy savings have never been proven,' according to Downing.

'The idea seems to have originated with Benjamin Franklin, who noticed in Paris in 1784 that people slept while the sun was up in during summer mornings, but complained about the cost of candles used at night. He suggested U.S. church bells be rung at sunrise, and if that didn't rise people, a cannon be fired.'

While the U.S. government followed Germany's example in changing the clocks during WWI and WWII, it was unpopular and repealed in peace time.

However, Downing says Wall Street preferred having fewer hours between the markets being open in New York and London and stores found they had more shoppers while it was still light, the Globe reported. The federal government made it official in 1966.

Of course, one negative result annually reported across the nation: the number of people who arrive late for work the Monday morning after the switch.

Standard time resumes in the United States at 2 a.m. the last Sunday in October."