Muggings became very painful to go through.

Did they? I still see them.

Mostly because of cost and aesthetics. It’s actually still a great dental repair material in terms of durability. I have a gold capped molar that I elected and pushed my dentist for after doing research, had a good conversation about trade-offs in materials vs going blindly with a default. My mother in law also has most of her fillings done with gold. But obviously it’s expensive and you need a dentist that is used to working with gold which is less common. Most people do not want front facing teeth in gold.

Fashion is fashion.

Styles come and go with no rhyme or reason.

My guess is that people were overdoing it to the point they just started to look silly.

You must not visit the hood very often.

I don’t know if they fell out of favor, but I know of at least one that fell out because of a paint can tied to a banister.

I’m not sure. I have one tooth that is capped with a silver metal, but not gold. My dad had a couple of gold caps.

My guess is that composite materials were cheaper and easier to work with. And lasted almost as well (my metal cap was done 25 years ago and is still holding up fine).

Too many death stares from the poor and downtrodden. And there are way more poor and downtrodden today, so flaunting wealth became uncomfortable.

way too expensive. plus now you can get a color matched ceramic crown in the same appointment you get a root canal. with cast metal fillings you have to send a mold to a foundry and wait for postage twice.

Why did we switch to IVs when god created leeches?? /s

TLDR better, more “toothlike” materials were developed.

Japan might have developed a drug that regrows teeth.

I don’t think this is the reason by any means, but I overheard a guy who had gold fillings until he had to remove them all in order to receive cancer treatment. I don’t know what treatment required him to not have metal in his head.