In March, the U.S. Senate approved a bill to end the twice-annual changing of the clocks and make Daylight Saving Time permanent. The legislation — which still needs the approval of the U.S. House and President Joe Biden — led many to point out that eliminating the changing of the clocks is quite popular, including in an Economist/YouGov poll from 2021.
A new YouGov poll, conducted March 16 - 20, finds similar levels of support (63% in 2021, 64% in 2022), but explores the topic in a little more detail. In this poll, we also asked Americans what time they start their weekdays and if they prefer to start their day when it’s dark or light outside. Desire for ending the twice-annual clock-changing practice is highest among Americans who start their day before 6 a.m., people who prefer starting their day in darkness, and people who are 65 and older.
Americans who say they'd like to stop changing the clocks were asked whether they would prefer permanent Daylight Saving Time or permanent Standard Time. If the bill for permanent Daylight Saving Time becomes law, Americans would keep their late sunsets in the spring, but also experience — for the first time for many — much later sunrises in the winter.
Americans who want to stop clock-changing prefer permanent Daylight Saving Time (53%) over permanent Standard Time (32%), but permanent Daylight Saving Time is most popular among people who prefer to start their day when it’s dark (59%) rather than when it’s light outside (49%). Americans who typically start their weekdays before 6 a.m. — and, therefore, would likely experience a few hours of darkness when the sunrise was set back — are more split on permanent Daylight Saving Time (47%) over Standard Time (38%).
Americans who start their weekdays after 8 a.m. are twice as likely to prefer Daylight Saving Time (54% to 25% who want permanent standard time).
-- Carl Bialik and Taylor Orth contributed to this article
See the toplines and crosstabs from this YouGov poll
Methodology: This U.S. News survey was conducted by YouGov using a nationally representative sample of 1,000 U.S. adult citizens interviewed online between March 16 - 20, 2022. This sample was weighted according to gender, age, race, and education based on the 2018 American Community Survey, conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau, as well as news interest and 2020 Presidential votes (or non-votes). Respondents were selected from YouGov’s opt-in panel to be representative of all U.S. citizens. The margin of error is approximately 4% for the entire sample.
Image: Getty
