Time Zones: Coordination vs Sunlight

In response to the recent changes to and from daylight savings time that have taken place across the globe, Tim Harford has a nice piece in Slate examining the tension between maximising coordination and maximising available sunlight.

Harford cites recent work undertaken by researchers in the U.S. looking at the effect of time zones on coordination, with some unsettling results:

"Rather depressingly, David Letterman outshines the sun in his effect on what people are doing. Push the television schedules an hour later and 5 percent of people will be watching television later—nearly a third of those actually watching the television. But if sunset is an hour later (because the individual is at the western end of a time zone), only half of 1 percent of people will watch later television."

Sad.

"Would the United States be better of with only one time zone?" - Tim Harford

(via Slate)