John Oliver tackled the most pressing question of the day on Sunday’s episode of Last Week Tonight: How is Daylight Saving Time still a thing?
Everyone seems to blame the existence of Daylight Saving Time on the farmers. But that blame is misplaced, because as Oliver put it, cows don’t care what time it is and we’ve all been unfairly accusing America’s agriculturalists.
The real instigator of the dreaded “spring forward” was Kaiser Wilhelm, who wanted to preserve daylight on the battlefields of World War I. Yes, you lost an hour of sleep thanks to Germany.
While the ritual of moving clocks forward one hour has old roots, the practice continues on the grounds that it conserves energy. However when Indiana instituted Daylight Saving Time it found the opposite to be truem and noted a 1% increase in energy consumption. There are two other areas that show a marked increased as well: researchers found that there is a rise in car accidents and work-related injuries the week after the time change.
Watch the full clip below:
Read next: Seriously, Stop Worrying About Daylight Saving Time
Get The Brief. Sign up to receive the top stories you need to know right now.
Listen to the most important stories of the day.
- How an Alleged Spy Balloon Derailed an Important U.S.-China Meeting
- Effective Altruism Has a Toxic Culture of Sexual Harassment and Abuse, Women Say
- Inside Bolsonaro's Surreal New Life as a Florida Man—and MAGA Darling
- 'Return to Office' Plans Spell Trouble for Working Moms
- 8 Ways to Read More Books—and Why You Should
- Why Aren't Movies Sexy Anymore?
- Column: Elon Musk Should Not Be in Charge of the Night Sky
- How Logan Paul's Crypto Empire Fell Apart
- 80 for Brady May Not Be a Masterpiece. But the World Needs More Movies Like This
