Clocks can change themselves as a technical matter. I haven't adjusted a clock for daylight savings in several years and I'm excited whenever I notice a theoret

Clocks can change themselves as a technical matter. I haven't adjusted a clock for daylight savings in several years and I'm excited whenever I notice a theoretical possibility. The time can change fairly simply because there's only one group of people who need to agree and, once they've agreed, it's binding also on those who disagree. For instance, here in Melbourne it's solely up to the Victorian parliament what timezone we're in and when we're in it. If a change is a contentious matter and after a year of debate it passes through parliament, everyone is subject to that. Business schedules are harder because there's many many business each of whom would have to go through their local processes. Moreover, it requires the consent not simply of the majority, but of a significant enough supermajority. If 40 per cent don't bother, then the whole system is likely to be thrown into confusion and we can't predict what will happen next year. Businesses could of course adopt a summer schedule of ten to six to complement their winter schedule of nine to five, but that requires activity on the part of a bunch of businesses who generally don't care enough and are generally happy with daylight savings. Also, businesses are not subject to the will of their employees. Business leaders might be perfectly happy to knock off work an hour early and play golf while their employees are still toiling away in dingy factories. Consequently, daylight savings would be the preserve of the powerful. Governments are subject to the will of the electorate. If we want daylight savings, we vote in a government who will give it to us. (In principle, this is supposed to work because we vote in a government who is populated by people who are like us and well enough connected to us that they work in our interests. In most countries, ideology (usually neoliberal) has come to dominate parties which nominally care about worker's interests so there isn't as much of a connection. We then lie and say "technology made it all bad" because it's easier to say "those nasty programmers stuffed the world" instead of saying "if we serve the interests of the few the world starts to get really unpleasant".)