Over time the loft angle on irons in matched sets has been reduced for multiple reasons. Manufacturers, always wanting to advertise longer distances than their competitors, sometimes "cheat" by de-lofting their iron sets by a degree or two compared to their competitor's set, producing between 2-5 yards of extra distance per degree of "strengthening". In addition, several significant advances in clubhead design, most notably the 1970s development of investment-cast "cavity-back" designs, and the 1990s introduction of clubfaces that increased backspin to improve "bite", resulted in clubs with higher launch angles and flight paths for the same loft angle than their predecessors. Clubmakers then compensated for this in both cases by reducing loft, to translate that higher flight path into greater distance. Currently, the pitching wedge of a typical matched iron set has a loft similar to a 9-iron from the 1980s, at about 46 degrees, and much stronger lofts are found in game improvement sets.