Daylight Savings Time is bad for criminals

Springing ahead might actually spring crime rates down, according to a study published in an MIT Press journal.

Researchers Jennifer Doleac and Nicholas Sanders found that the start of Daylight Saving Time is linked to fewer robberies in the weeks after the clocks move forward.

“Results show that daily cases of robbery, a violent and socially costly street crime, decrease by approximately 7% in the weeks after DST begins, with a 19% drop in the probability of any robbery occurring,” the scholars wrote. “A 27% decrease in the robbery rate during the sunset hours drives much of this result.”

In other words: more daylight, fewer holdups — at least in the early evening window when robberies often happen.

Doleac and Sanders based their conclusions on crime report data and argue the mechanism is pretty simple. With more daylight later in the day, more people are out and about, which means more potential witnesses and fewer opportunities for someone to try something stupid unnoticed.

So, yes, losing an hour of sleep still feels like a scam. But if the trade-off is a measurable dip in robbery rates, DST may have one redeeming quality after all.