The number that we assign to a time of day doesn't have any intrinsic meaning, it's just a symbol.
Of my friends, I think I'm one of the only ones who gets to dictate what time I go into and leave from work. I think it's fairly unique to the tech industry, this ability.
It is indeed just a symbol, time, but the symbol is given meaning by most people's employers, and as such ends up carrying significant meaning in a person's own life as well.
Another example: bus frequency. You know, small stuff that adds up ;)
There may be other, poor, reasons, that it sucks for you (like other people insisting on going by a certain clock time) but I don't understand the children part.
School hours, public transit hours, business open hours (banks, law-mandated bar closing times, etc.), friends who work at enforced hours (most people, in my experience).
Though sometimes (like in Western China, where time is really off), businesses run on a 'de facto' local time zone (10-7 Beijing) rather than say 8-5 Beijing time
Similarly, the overall preference seems to be to shift things to a later time rather than earlier
Most employers that I know, while being somewhat flexible, still require being in the office for certain hours of the day, 10-3 seems to be popular in my area. If you want to work the rest of the hours early or late you can. Any way you look at it when it gets dark at 4 that doesn't leave much time for most people.
Always going to be less daylight in the winter, but I think the argument for moving the daylight later in the day is an easy one.