Furthermore, the report concluded, redlining (which branded ghettos “high risk” investment areas) converged with exploitative commercial practices to ensure that “the low-income consumer is often forced to rely for credit and loans on loan sharks or unscrupulous merchants whose credit charges are often considerably higher than the legitimate financial institutions to which he is denied access.”15 These businesses were a source of considerable resentment in many ghettos and became primary targets of looting and destruction during the widespread urban rioting of the mid- to late 1960s.
