What's the difference?

Any inputs on this? Thanks

There is no difference in terms of their meaning.
About their grammatical function, I hope these following examples would help you figure out:
His sickness was due to a viral infection. ('due to' is adjectival)
He fell sick because of/owning to a viral infection. ('because of' and 'owning to' are adverbial)
However, in America, I think people in their speaking use 'due to' and 'own

Thanks for your reply, but I am still not clear. It is "owing", not "owning" as you wrote it.

In your example, are you saying that "Car accidents happen due to people's carelessness" is grammatically wrong?

Thanks.

AnonymousIn your example, are you saying that "Car accidents happen due to people's carelessness" is grammatically wrong?

It was once considered wrong, but is now generally accepted. H.W. Fowler and Eric Partridge both condemned this use of "due to", Fowler going so far as to call people who use it thus "illiterates". Nevertheless, "due to" is now widely used

Thanks Blue Jay. So, can "due to", "owing to", and "because of" be used interchangeably? Are there any guidelines at all?

What triggered me to ask this question is due to (careful now) some corrections I received from a journal paper reviewer. I give two examples below:

1) Thickness plays an important role on the performance of semiconductor devices owing to (replacing "due to")

Owing to is certainly correct. My own opinion is that those who object to due to were long ago overwhelmed by usage, but if your editor is a stickler for the matter I would respect his or her opinion on the subject, and stay away from due to. The journal may have a style manual they use; also, they will probably receive angry letters if they include anythi

Anonymousbecause of due to owing to

I don't think you could get me to use "owing to" if you paid me! I might say "due to" instead, but if "because of" worked, I'd use that before I'd use either of the others. Just saying.

My apologies. I realize this is not very informative because it's only a personal opinion.

CJ

"A rule of thumb I came across is that you can use due to if, and only if, you could replace it with caused by without altering the rest of the sentence or changing the meaning."

Thanks for the guideline!