The impossible problem

Welcome to Spring!?

Which feels a bit strange given that it is 30 degrees outside, and 60 plus vehicles were?caught in a snow squall pile-up?in Pennsylvania on Monday.

Nevertheless, Spring is here, so:

1. The clock is ticking on taxes; April 18 is the deadline. So we need your information now if we don't already have it.?
2. And on the topic of ticking clocks: the daylight savings debate is back.

It turns out that daylight savings may be the ultimate unsolvable problem.

More on that in a second.

Key Updates

• Understanding wills and estate planning:?continuing on the theme of estate planning from last time, we answer a question that comes up a lot. What is the difference between estate planning, a will, and how to plan for the inevitable??Read more here.
• How are fringe benefits taxed??With the tight labor market, many companies turn to fringe benefits to retain and attract employees. But benefits have tax consequences, so we've put together a post outlining how these benefits are taxed.?Read more here.
• Personal taxes are due on April 18; the deadline is upon us! Please make sure we have all your documents now.??

Literally, since the beginning of time, societies have been adjusting schedules to make more use of long summer days.

The Romans kept time with water clocks that would adjust for the time of year.

They had 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of night regardless of the time of year.?Hora tertia,?or the third hour after sunrise, lasted 44 minutes at the winter solstice and 75 minutes at the summer solstice.

Now?that?is complicated.

If shifting an hour in October and March causes car accidents, strokes, and heart attacks (as some suggest), what would constantly shifting hours be like?

Many attribute our daylight savings time regime to Benjamin Franklin, but he was kidding.?

His letter in The Journal of Paris showed how many candles Paris could save by changing the clocks. But it was?meant?to be a joke. Nobody took it seriously until at least 110 years later when the real debate started.

New Zealand entomologist George Hudson kicked off that one.

He wanted more time to study bugs. Candle saving was ho-hum, but bug studying caught people's attention.

His suggestion traveled the world, and Port Arthur, a city in Ontario, Canada, first implemented it in 1908.

In the US, we held out until 1918 when we implemented daylight savings as a way to save energy during World War I. Whether or not it does save energy is a matter of debate, often supported by referring to Benjamin Franklin's satirical letter.

And so it goes on and on and on. The more things change, the more they stay the same. (Hmmm, where did I recently see that?)

In the latest daylight savings news on March 16 of this year, the Senate unanimously approved a measure to make daylight savings time permanent.??

We did this once before in 1974. It lasted until 1975.

It turns out that charcoal companies, golf courses, and candy companies (who want an extra hour for trick or treating) love having the extra hour in the evening.?

But, those who have to wake up and trek to school or work in the winter darkness would prefer to have the hour in the morning.?

So, the debate is likely to rage on forever.

I don't think we will ever agree. It's just one of those things.??

Personally, I am aggressively neutral on the political debate. I do enjoy the long summer evenings by the pool with good company and a glass of wine.

But, I suspect I'd continue even if there were an hour less sunshine.

And I don't need the light to study bugs.?

I just hope we don't shift to changing an hour's length based on the time of year. That would be very confusing.?

Wherever you stand on the daylight savings debate, have a great start to Spring, and watch out for those snow squall pile-ups.??

From Around The Web

The original daylight savings proposal was a joke,?consistent with the never-ending discussion, Benjamin Franklin's letter suggesting daylight savings was satire. The Journal of Paris published Franklin's letter in 1784. You can read it?here.?My observation? Humor has changed.??

Probably though the first serious daylight savings proposal was to study bugs.?In true daylight savings fashion, the suggestion was self-centered: in 1895 New Zealander George Hudson proposed daylight savings time so that he would have more time to study insects,?read more here. This seems funnier than Franklin's suggestion, but what do I know.