It’s been said that getting 90 percent of Americans to do anything is nearly impossible. Officers managing traffic stops might have good cause to disagree because last year, when Americans got into their cars, nearly nine out of ten—86 percent—wore their seat belts. Today, buckling up is such an accepted norm that it’s hard to believe that, as recently as the 1970s, roughly 90 percent of Americans did not use seat belts.

Driver behavior has, without exaggeration, flipped 180 degrees over the past four decades. That reversal can be attributed to a number of things, from legislation at the state level to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s (NHTSA’s) Click It or Ticket campaign.