McGraw-Hill cuts 550 jobs

NEW YORK (AP) -- McGraw-Hill Cos., hit by declines in its education, financial services and media properties, said Thursday it has cut 550 jobs.

The New York company, which publishes textbooks and owns BusinessWeek magazine and the credit-ratings agency Standard & Poor's, said it will take a $24.3 million pretax charge for severance costs in the second quarter.

McGraw-Hill said the deepest cutbacks were in the education unit, which lost 340 positions, followed by information and media with 125 and financial services with 85.

The recession has cut across a broad swath of the company's businesses. McGraw-Hill reported a 22 percent drop in first quarter profit in April.

Revenue from the education and financial services units fell more than 5 percent year-over-year. Information and media, including BusinessWeek and J.D. Power and Associates, saw revenue slide 7.4 percent.

This week the company signaled that it may seek a buyer for BusinessWeek, which is facing an industrywide crises brought on by the shift of advertisers to the Internet on top of a severe recession.

McGraw-Hill reports earnings later this month.

Its shares fell 28 cents to $31.80 in morning trading Thursday.

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