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Mortgage defaults within a neighborhood may tip the scales whereby a vicious cycle of disinvestment and deterioration in the surrounding neighborhoods begins. This paper aims to examine the impact that mortgage default has on properties in the same ZIP code and neighboring ZIP codes.

Hypothesizing that neighborhoods' susceptibility to cascade failure can be measured by the rate of acceleration of mortgage failures within the neighborhood, the paper introduces a model to investigate whether or not this vicious cycle is such that mortgage failures multiply, and there is a tipping point at which the downward cycle accelerate.

The paper applies the model to data for the Los Angeles metropolitan area for the period 2006-2007 and finds evidence of a tipping point.

The paper is limited by the availability of data with respect to both time and space.

A failure tipping point will provide a signal that mortgage crisis is pending. Reacting to this signal could allow financial markets to avert such crises in the future.

Some neighborhoods may resist being labelled as one with significant mortgage failure activity. This resistance may cause a negative reaction to these results and implementation for the findings.

To-date, no evidence of a mortgage failure tipping point has been discovered in the literature.

This study seeks to investigate perceptions of the role of location on the performance of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Tangier, as understood by local owner-managers.

To explore perceptions of the performance/location relationship for SMEs in Tangier, 20 in-depth online semi-structured interviews were conducted with selected owner-managers of SMEs. The judgement sample was selected to explore their experiences, beliefs and attitudes with respect to their performance and location.

Findings of the study revealed that “location” is a salient factor that, in the minds of respondents, materially influences the performance of SMEs in Tangier. Location was mentioned extensively in the interviews, in relation to the “free zones”. Findings showed that firms located within the free zones enjoyed favourable economic conditions, in particular those related to taxation and competition, compared to their counterparts located outside the free zones, which were excluded from these benefits. Furthermore, perceived unfair competition (financial and fiscal incentives in the free zones) damages the performance of the SMEs in Tangier. These findings suggest that the placement of the business in relation to the free zones and in respondents' perception thus became an important financial and emotionally significant perspective on equality in relation to success.

The findings of the study could encourage the government to adopt policies that will assist indigenous firms to benefit from advantages that are comparable to those that are available to those in the free zones. Greater attention to the perceptual effects of location would be advantageous. However, the exploratory nature of the study means that results cannot necessarily be generalised beyond the setting in which the data were collected. Future research should examine the impact of location for SMEs in a broader sample of countries.

This study is among those few studies located in the Middle East North Africa (MENA) region that explore the performance of SMEs from the perceptions of owner-managers themselves and not based on aggregate or economic data. It supports previous findings of several studies and contributes additional evidence that suggests the significance of levelling the playing field and its impact on SME performance in the contemporary African business context.

MY SELF‐RESTRAINT in refraining until thus far through the year from mention of the game of cricket is not, I'm afraid, due to a waning of interest with the onset of old age (it's my birthday next week), but to a ripe contentment with the Ashes victory in Australia during the winter, plus the realisation that cricket is hardly a suitable subject for discussion in the arctic weather conditions we have been experiencing during the first three months of 1979.

THERE has recently sprung up a great interest in antiques, probably due to Arthur Negus and his TV and broadcast programmes, and perhaps it is this which has made county librarians also, think about their past and their beginnings. Gloucestershire was the first to become aware of the fact that its library was fifty years old, and that a genuine antique, in the shape of its first librarian, still existed and could be questioned about the early days. So in December, 1967, the Gloucestershire Library Committee staged a most successful 50th birthday party, and invited me to cut the birthday cake, on which were 50 candles! And a very great occasion it was.

A YEAR having now elapsed since I concluded the sale of Clive Bingley Ltd, and the contract of sale having contained, at my insistence, a provision that I would remain with the company for not less than six months (to ensure a satisfactory transfer to the new regime) and not more than twelve months (to prevent the new regime being lumbered with an old fuddy‐duddy), I have now resigned my employment with Clive Bingley Ltd, and with the associated companies set up last year to encompass its projected expansion, namely K G Saur Ltd and KGS Reference Services Ltd. In lieu of my former directorships, I have agreed to act as a consultant to these companies for as long as either of us thinks I can be of service to them, a status which recognises the role 1 have in practical terms been playing during the months since the companies abandoned Pembridge Road for plushier new offices in the West End of London.

THIS is the month when the public librarian again faces his annual estimates. Things are rarely exactly easy for him. This year may be no exception, as there will be in some places an effort to lop off the non‐essential works of local authorities. It is at this time that some librarians wish the service ceased to be local, because town councillors as a whole believe so much in the local character of government and do not realize that if they reduce on such things as libraries they are placing their own people at a disadvantage in relation to other towns. That is the soundest reason, and one that cannot too often be stressed, for some sort of imposed standard of service, which cannot be varied too greatly because of some temporary condition of local or national finance. We do not anticipate crippling reductions anywhere, but the signs for advance are not more propitious than in the bad old days. We shall be interested to hear of special cases this year, but hope that they will be few. We know that salaries cannot, at present, be greatly affected, but even librarians do not live for pay‐cheques alone; they want books, light, heat and many more things to revive, if not to improve, their service.

International business theory leans heavily on neoclassical economics, ignoring its unrealistic assumptions and the many changes in the environment. The chapter calls for a revision of the theory to a contingency theory. The major contingent elements analysed are the political system, business–government and NGOs relations, industries, regimes, ownership patterns, the degree of reliance on ethical behaviour, the institutional environment and social norms.