Rhode Island, New Zealand, and southern California recently reported sharp increases in sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Health department officials stated that these increases appeared to be due to the more widespread use of social media like Tinder, Grindr, and Facebook, which allow users to readily connect with and meet others. The purpose of this study was to see if U.S. states that have more users of social networking sites, dating sites, and dating apps like Match.com, Ashley Madison, Our Time, Down Dating, Bumble, Zoosk, Hinge, Score, At First Sight, Plenty of Fish, Eharmony, Adult Friend Finder, Tinder, Grindr, and Facebook have more cases of STDs after controlling for population, race, age, income, education, and population density. It was found that states with more users of Match.com, OKCupid, and Down Dating had a larger number of cases of STDs, while states with more users of Our Time, Ashley Madison, Facebook, How About We, Hinge, Adult Friend Finder, Grindr, Bumble, Score, Tinder, and At First Sight had fewer cases of STDs. While social networking sites make it easier for individuals to be exposed to an STD since in-network individuals may share an STD, many sites either attract individuals who are not interested in a short-term sexual relationship or who take precautions to avoid contracting an STD.

Overlooked in higher education student retention policies is the effect of class size on student achievement. Decreasing constant-dollar legislative appropriations and growing undergraduate enrollments will continue to strain instructional budgets. One obvious administrator response is to increase class sizes, which raises concerns of negative effects on minority student achievement. Reported are findings that class size does exercise negative effects on the academic performance of Hispanic students.

This study investigates the non-linear effect of the cash conversion cycle (CCC) on a firm’s profitability for a sample of 6072 firms from five countries (Germany, Spain, France, Great Britain, and Italy) from 2006 to 2015. Additionally, this study explores the sensitivity of economic crises to the non-linear effect of the CCC on a firm’s performance. This study employs fixed-effects unbalanced panel data and weighted least squares (due to heteroscedasticity) to examine a firm’s performance, using return on assets (ROA) to measure profitability. The cash conversion cycle, financial leverage, size, and tangibility are independent variables. The results of this study show that the effect of the cash conversion cycle on firms’ performance is an inverted U-shape (non-linear). It also shows that the economic conditions vis-à-vis crises influence firm performance. This study found the optimal number of the CCC to be 90 days for the entire sample, 85 days for the non-crisis period, and 92 days for the crisis period. It also finds that the marginal effect of the CCC on ROA is 3.9 times higher during economic crises versus non-economic crisis periods. This study contributes to the existing working capital management literature by examining the non-linear effect of the cash conversion cycle on profitability and the sensitivity of these effects during economic crises. Thus, empirical evidence can serve scholars, business policymakers, and corporate finance professionals in managing their working capital strategically.

This study investigates whether economic crises matter in profitability and, in this context, the (non) linear role of the cash conversion cycle for a sample of firms from five EU countries. The study employs unbalanced panel data fixed effect to examine two dependent variables: return on assets and net margin. Independent variables are the cash conversion cycle, financial leverage, size, tangibility, cash flow ratio, and inventory investments. Results of this study reveal that longer cash conversion periods are associated with lower profitability, with the effect being more pronounced in the absence of crises. Further, the study shows a non-linear relationship between profitability and cash conversion cycle, and diminishing returns are observed by using a squared cash conversion cycle. The study contributes to the existing working capital management literature by examining the effect of the cash conversion cycle on profitability from an international perspective and the effect of economic crises. Thus, empirical evidence can serve scholars, business policymakers, and professionals of corporate finance in managing their working capital strategically.