One of the most intractable, contentious and niche issues in US politics has come back into the spotlight. This week, the US House of Representatives voted to make daylight saving time permanent in the United States.

The Sunshine Protection Act, which the House approved by a bipartisan vote of 308–117, would implement year-round daylight saving time nationwide. This would effectively extend the current eight-month period of daylight saving to cover the four winter months, in which standard time is observed.

Having now passed the House, it will head to the Senate, where it is likely to encounter stiff opposition even from some Republicans.

President Donald Trump promised before his second inauguration to “eliminate” the “inconvenient, and very costly” twice-yearly clock changes.

But it may not be so easy. Debate has raged for decades between sleep scientists and industry groups as to whether the time change should be abolished in favour of year-round standard time (with brighter mornings and darker evenings), or year-round daylight saving time (with darker mornings and brighter evenings).

While it may appear to be an academic choice between the two, they would have radically different impacts on the lives of hundreds of millions of Americans.

Daylight saving’s moment in the sun

The debate over whether or not daylight saving is worth the trouble has progressed little in the past century. Senators as far back as 1919 argued over whether or not the benefits of daylight saving time for urban workers outweighed drawbacks for farmers.

The cost of shifting........

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