I had a teenager swear to me the other day that his English teacher told them they should never use the expression “due to…”, as in “Due to overwhelming demand…” or something like that. The student said that the correct wording is “owing to…”, and that ‘due’ is only correct when talking about something that has a due date, like a bill or library book.
I have never come across this before and was wondering if anyone else had. Is there an basis for this at all?
There’s nothing grammatically wrong with it. “Due to” is completely standard.
You just have to realize that some people are compelled to complain about things regardless of any actual substance. If you’re put in a situation where you are absolutely required to speak or write a perfectly innocuous English, then perhaps this form is to be avoided. Otherwise, don’t bother worrying about it.
I always say “because of” when writing for publication, just because some people have nothing to do but complain. But I see nothing wrong with it. I use “due to” when I mean “expected,” as in “The train is due to arrive.”
I don’t know of any rule like that, but there’s this “due to”/“because of” rule I generally ignore in all but the most formal of situations.
The Merriam-webster link agrees --there is no such rule, but apparently there’s an English teacher in New Jersey who thinks otherwise.
Sorry, that was supposed to contain this link.
Man, I remember this very point being brought up in on the the Dobie Gillis short stories* by Max Shulman, written back in the late 40s. Dobie ran up against a professor who said “Due to” was incorrect and the upshot was that eventually the professor changed his mind and agreed that it was perfectly fine.
So the English teacher is fighting a battle that was lost almost 60 years ago.
*The precursor to the movie and TV show.
According to The New Fowler’s Modern English Usage:
“Used as prepositional phrase in verbless clause = owing to, due to was described as “erroneous” [gives examples of the usage being criticized in 1940 and 1926]…Hostility to the construction is an entirely 20c. phenomenon. Opinion remains sharply divided, but it begins to look as if this use of due to will form part of the natural language of the 21c. as one more example of a forgotten battle.”
Although maybe not as forgotten as all that, based on this thread…
“Owing to” sounds horrible to me, and seems like it is usually used incorrectly.
I go with “because of” as well, to avoid the “due to” issue.
If the teacher was going to go overboard on being literal, why did he or she feel “owing to” was correct? If I said “The wildfires in California increased this year, owing to the lower than average rainfall” what exactly is owed? Did increased rainfall in past years create a debt that California is now obligated to repay?
As others have said, if you can’t bear to use “due to” then “because of” is the correct replacement.
I don’t mind “due to” although I always use “because of.” However, when I see “due to the fact that”, my editorial pencil comes out so fast you’ll never even see it. 