Tillmann Prüfer is a member of the editor-in-chief of “Zeit-Magazin”.
It was almost a week ago now, and I still haven’t gotten to normal time. It’s already winter time in the study, it’s still summer time on the clock radio in the bedroom, and the clock on the kitchen stove has not yet been set.
In a sense, I live in a no man’s land between times. It is just too exhausting for me to change all the clocks. It is not so unusual that there are different times in the same country. When Germany was still made up of small states, each city had its own local time. It was only through the railway network that it became necessary to create a uniform time zone. And if you look at the punctuality of the train, you get the feeling that you haven’t really understood that there until today.
I don’t either, by the way. I don’t really think it’s a nice idea that winter time should be the normal time. I was able to sleep an hour longer, but I didn’t even notice this hour; while, conversely, the hour that I have to get up earlier when switching to summer time remains in my bones for days.
It is regularly lamented that the EU has wanted to abolish the time change for a long time; it is described as one of the few sensible recommendations of the EU Commission. But nothing has come of it so far.
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The current time control has existed since 1980. Before that, the clock had to be adjusted for 30 years. Between 1916 and 1950, however, there had been all sorts of time models. Between May and June 1947, the Moscow era had ruled the whole of Germany. Thus the period after 1980 can also be seen as an era of temporal stability.
Disturbance of the biorhythm
Never before since the First World War did citizens know so consistently when to sleep an hour longer and an hour shorter. It is said again and again that the time change brings a small amount of electricity savings because you can save some lighting, but you pay more elsewhere. This includes the health costs due to the disruption of the biorhythm, an increased number of traffic accidents, reduced work performance in the offices and the increased consumption of heating energy. Allegedly, it should be the cheapest scenario if there was only daylight saving time. Around six euros could then be saved per one-person household.
My own proposal for time reform: just let people sleep an hour longer every day and introduce the 25-hour day. For one thing, sleep is healthy. At the same time, it would make the year 15 days longer.
So we would all stay older more slowly and young longer. But at the same time die a few years earlier. That would relieve the pension fund enormously. I suggest that to the EU Commission. I’m still changing the clock radio. I’ll wait another six months by the stove clock, then it’s all right again.
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