Scientists estimate that in about five billion years, the Sun will exhaust its supply of hydrogen, swell to “Red Giant” status and begin its slow death – engulfing Earth and the inner planets in a wall of fire and ending life as we know it in our solar system.
That’s the bad news for those of us on Earth, including our more than 30,000 golf courses.
The Good The news is that as far as golf’s existential crises go, it’s not too urgent! Before we can get to the bottom of that first question: what to do against the sun in five billion years? – we should have enough time to find out what the cause is other existential questions, such as foreign investment from sovereign wealth funds, the threat posed by the slow march of distance winnings and the struggle to keep an old, slow sport relevant in an increasingly younger, attention-deprived world.
But it turns out that in 2025 the sun still has some shine as a wave problem. It’s a big enough problem to have emboldened Jay Karen, the golf club’s CEO National Golf Course Owners Association of America (NGCOA), to speak for the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Energy and Commerce on Thursday morning. And as Karen explained to Congress, the opportunities for American golfers are night and day.
As much as I’d like to keep making corny astronomical puns for the rest of this story, the actual content here is actually quite relevant to the daily lives of American golfers: Daylight Saving Time, the annual tradition where (most of) America “falls back” and “springs forward” for an hour each year. Daylight saving time plays a crucial role in the health of the golf industry several billion dollars role, if you believe the latest estimates from the NGCOA.
That’s how Karen and the NGCOA got into Congress, and why they’re now on the front lines of the fight to make daylight saving time full-time.
“Our data shows that the golf industry as a whole will increase by at least 1 percent, at a minimum,” Karen said during the House committee hearing. “I would estimate so [changing to permanent Daylight Saving Time alone would add] 2-5 percent in the Gulf economy overnight.”
The story of the permanent daylight saving time movement—and of the golf industry’s potential windfall—begins, like so many other American stories, on a battlefield in Europe.
The first American experiment with daylight saving time began in 1918 with the Standard time law, a law passed at the height of World War I that aimed to encourage energy conservation during the war effort. The legislation was controversial from the start. Farmers took to the streets to protest the loss of morning light and the spectacular annoyance of being out of sync with the townspeople buying their produce. The law was repealed soon after and re-enacted in the 1940s to support American efforts in World War II.
In 1966, the national disagreement reached a weak compromise among the “Uniform Time Law.The law installed America’s current half-daylight saving, half-standard time approach—but the solution was a half-measure, and like so many half-measures, it was deeply unpopular on both sides of the debate.
The clock controversy calmed some in the 1960s, but never completely disappeared. In 1974, the US government tampered with permanent daylight saving time to save energy during an oil shortage. (Voters hated the dark mornings, and the on-again, off-again system was reinstated.) In the ’80s and ’90s, a collection of consumer brands and citizen advocates formed the ‘Daylight Savings Coalition”, fighting for the return of permanent daylight saving time under the guise that it could boost consumer spending. And in the early 2000s, the government expanded daylight saving time by another four weeks, giving daylight saving time the largest share of the annual calendar.
But none of these moves brought as much change as the rather sudden effort that emerged in the U.S. Senate three years ago, in March 2022, when lawmakers began debating a bill called the Sunshine Protection Act. The SPA, as it was called, was a simple text by congressional standards: that’s what it was only one page and a length of a few hundred words. The goal was unique: to reinstate daylight saving time as the permanent law of the land, and it fell on sympathetic ears in the winter-weary Senate chamber.
After a short debate, the SPA was put to the vote. The bill passed unanimously and received no shortage of fanfare on social media. It was quickly sent to the House of Representatives for review and then forwarded to then-President Joe Biden’s desk for signature.
Inside Old Petty, Tom Doak’s new design in the Scottish Highlands
By means of:
Jos Sens
What happened behind closed doors in the following days that agreement remains a mystery, but what happened in public is a simple fact: the Sunshine Protection Act died in the House of Representatives without ever getting a vote. Some members of the U.S. House of Representatives blamed “stalled momentum” for the lack of action, while others said it was simply not a “legislative priority.” Whatever the reason, the bill sat in the House of Representatives for more than three years without a vote, occasionally resurfacing for further consideration by smaller “committees” of the U.S. House of Representatives.
On Thursday, Karen was invited to testify before one such group – the Committee on Energy and Commerce – about the potential impact of permanent daylight saving time (or permanent standard time) on the golf industry. It didn’t take long for the head of the golf trade group to make his point.
“Our data shows that permanent standard time would cost the industry at least $1.6 billion per year,” said Karen. “That’s approximately $200,000 lost in revenue per golf course, and 37 million rounds of golf lost.”
Karen said golf depends on what he calls “recreational daylight time,” or when the sun overlaps with people’s ability to be outdoors. American golfers prefer to be outside in the afternoon and evening, which can generate 40 percent more revenue for courses than in the morning.
“It actually unlocks an amazing amount of inventory for the golf industry,” says Karen. “And that’s just the golf industry, but it also translates into good health for Americans.”
According to the NGCOA, course operators agree that extra sun is good for business and golfers. The only concern, Karen said, was that a permanent shift to daylight saving time could impact some golf courses’ ability to provide adequate time off to clubhouse staff and employees.
“A survey found that approximately 64 percent of our members support permanent daylight saving time, while 83 percent agree it would help their business,” said Karen. “Twenty-seven percent are in favor of the status quo, and only 7 percent are in favor of permanent standard time.”
In the eyes of the NGCOA, there is only one solution: if America is going to change its relationship with sunlight, a turn back of the clocks is necessary.
“If we eliminate clock changes, we are in favor of permanent daylight saving time,” Karen said.
At least for the next 4.9 billion years.
#golf #worlds #big #battle #Congress.. #sun