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> When we note that acceptance of gays has become mainstream or that smoking has decreased or that people get married later, we don't presume that it has to do with abortion rates or leaded gasoline -- we just understand that cultural shifts happen.

We absolutely try to discover the causes of those shifts. There are similar articles about why those things are happening, too, in each case!

So, not necessarily this article, but I haven't seen much in sociological or economics literature that's put forth one single reason crime dropped. There's argument over primary causes, or how much each cause contributes to the drop, but not much about single unifying theories.

> smoking

Tobacco.

This is an important distinction. Tobacco usage has gone down. Electronic cigarettes, however, are booming among former tobacco users. Americans are also opening up to marijuana legalization.