redlining

thumb|upright=1.35|A 1937 Home Owners' Loan Corporation|HOLC "residential security" map of [[Philadelphia, classifying various neighborhoods by estimated "riskiness" of mortgage loans]] Redlining is a discriminatory practice in which financial services are withheld from neighborhoods that have significant numbers of racial and ethnic minorities. Redlining has been most prominent in the United States, and has mostly been directed against African Americans, as well as Mexican Americans in the Southwestern United States. The most common examples involve denial of credit and insurance, denial of healthcare, and the development of food deserts in minority neighborhoods.

Reverse redlining occurs when a lender or insurer targets majority-minority neighborhood residents with inflated interest rates by taking advantage of the lack of lending competition relative to non-redlined neighborhoods. The effect also emerges when service providers artificially restrict the supply of real estate available for loanable funds to nonwhites, thus providing alternative pretext for higher rates. Neighborhoods which were targeted for blockbusting were also subject to reverse redlining.