I always thought that DST is unnecessary and did not really understand the rationale behind it. I mean, sure, in 1916 it might have made sense to conserve those cca. 3% in home electricity consumption. Today, however, spending more time at home in the heat may introduce additional costs through higher use of air condition. I guess wikipedia's article on DST rationale can explain better than I can :)
That said, doing away with DST is IMO not necessary. People are already used to it and there is little confusion, even if people have to be reminded each year. How the benefits compare to the drawbacks I cannot judge, there are different arguments either way.
But...
The way the EU decided to approach this is worse. Every country will be able to decide whether they want to keep summer time or they want the "normal" time? I think that's another example where the compromise just destroys every benefit of the proposal.
I live in a small country where a lot of our businesses work with neighbouring countries. There is even a significant percentage of people that live here but go to work to another country. So, the kids' kindergarten will use a different time than your workplace?
I think this will create much more confusion and stress if the different countries choose different times than the problems we have now with the switching.
I guess there are countries that have this problem already (if the neighbouring country is in a different time zone) but still we may introduce the problem to places that did not have it before.
That said, doing away with DST is IMO not necessary. People are already used to it and there is little confusion, even if people have to be reminded each year. How the benefits compare to the drawbacks I cannot judge, there are different arguments either way.
But...
The way the EU decided to approach this is worse. Every country will be able to decide whether they want to keep summer time or they want the "normal" time? I think that's another example where the compromise just destroys every benefit of the proposal.
I live in a small country where a lot of our businesses work with neighbouring countries. There is even a significant percentage of people that live here but go to work to another country. So, the kids' kindergarten will use a different time than your workplace?
I think this will create much more confusion and stress if the different countries choose different times than the problems we have now with the switching.
I guess there are countries that have this problem already (if the neighbouring country is in a different time zone) but still we may introduce the problem to places that did not have it before.