S&P Guild members protest McGraw-Hill plan to offshore jobs

For some S&P Guild members who distributed leaflets around the company's lower Manhattan headquarters on March 28, McGraw-Hill's plan to offshore jobs to India hits close to home. Several S&P jobs could be affected.

Thousands of McGraw-Hill jobs at risk

S&P Guild members held a lunchtime protest on March 28 over plans by the company's parent, the McGraw-Hill Companies Inc., to send thousands of good-paying U.S.-based jobs to India.

The quiet protest from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. outside S&P’s headquarters at 55 Water St. consisted of a rotating group of about 40 Guild members at any given point, who spent their lunch hours distributing flyers and denouncing the layoffs that would result from the offshoring of jobs.

Joining S&P Guild members in leafletting were Gary Schoichet of the New York Administrative Employees (CWA Local 1180), Larry Goldberg of the National Writers Union and Pete Matsoukas of the United Federation of Teachers.

The S&P Guild members were joined by members of theUnited Federation of Teachers, the National Writers Union, the New York Administrative Employees, AFSCME 375 District Council 37, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and members of Occupy Wall Street.

McGraw-Hill CEO Terry McGraw, who sits on President Obama’s Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations, has already sent thousands of American jobs to India, where workers make a fraction of what U.S. workers earn. Despite posting a $911 million profit in 2011 (up 10 percent from 2010), McGraw wants to offshore thousands more U.S.-based jobs, including a number of Guild-represented jobs at Standard & Poor’s.

McGraw made his position clear in a recent op-ed piece in the Indian business daily, the Business Standard: “we all know a more prosperous India could move us closer towards a goal everyone around the world wants: a global economy at full throttle.”

But what about a fully employed United States with a strong middle class to buy products and services from around the world. Doesn’t “a global economy at full throttle” need that too?

From left, S&P Guild members Margaretann Mancini, Lan Lecour and Richard Weitz, S&P Guild Unit Chair Ed Fannon, Guild Rep. Bob Townsend and S&P Guild members Patricia Hinson and Darrin Bently.

Call McGraw-Hill CEO Terry McGraw at 212-512-6205 and tell him to keep Standard & Poor’s jobs and other McGraw-Hill jobs here.