Estimated read time: 1-2 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY — Losing an hour of sleep can ruin your day. Groginess, tiredness, loss of productivity, iritability — all things that can be caused by not getting a good night's sleep.
Every year, most of the nation loses an hour of sleep when we spring forward into Daylight Saving Time, which this year happened Sunday morning.
Not only can losing that hour hurt your sleep schedule, it can cost you money, according to a study from the SleepBetter.org, a sleep website run by mattress maker Carpenter.
Nationally, that lost hour cost Americans $434 million, including lost productivity due to cyberloafing, workplace injury and even increased incidence of heart attacks.
Utah fared slightly below the average for states that observe Daylight Saving Time, with Salt Lake City residents losing about $1,401,163, according to the study. The loss was roughly $1 per person in the state.
Most of that loss came in the form of costs associated with increased incidents of hear attacks, amounting to about $1,180,483 for Salt lake residents and over half a million for the Provo-Orem area. The data on heart attacks came from a 2008 study in The New England Journal of Medicine.
Cyberloafing — wasting time on the Internet while on the clock — came in second in terms of cost, costing Salt Lake residents over $200,000 and Provo-Orem residents over $60,000.
Originally instituted to save on energy costs by adding an extra hour of daylight to the evening during winter months, the practice has seen praise and criticism. Retailers and some athletic businesses benefit from the extra light allowing for longer shopping and playing time.
Certain agricultural industries have traditionally been against it, including dairy farmers and some crop farmers.
Video contribution: Nkoyo Iyamba
