Michael Peel, Yale's Vice President for Human Resources and Administration, said Yale will double the severance benefits from one week of pay per year of service to two for those laid-off, and all will be guaranteed at least four weeks severance, the paper reported. The university had slated 600 positions for elimination, and normal, annual attrition can only account for about 300-500 of the positions to be phased-out, necessitating the lay-offs. Yale does not expect scholarships or the education core to be affected by the cuts.

New Haven, Conn.-based Yale had almost $23 billion in endowments as of 2008, trailing only national leader Harvard University's $36.6 billion, according to data compiled by the National Association of College and University Business Officers. (pdf)

Yale's last large-scale lay-off occurred in 2004, when 74 positions were cut, the Yale Daily News reported.

Economic Analysis: Yale's cuts underscore the breadth of the U.S. recession. Yale is perhaps one of the institutions that's most-immune -- or insulated, if you will -- from the business cycle that so dominates the U.S. economy. Yale is a well-funded, elite, private, non-profit organization but it, too, has felt the sting of the financial crisis and recession -- from lower returns on its endowment investments, to reduced grants, to lower charitable contributions.

Further, investors should view Yale's decision as a barometer of the economy: Yale's charter and culture is very pro-employee. In other words, Yale would not cut positions unless economic conditions indicated they absolutely had to -- that there was no other way to overcome a large deficit, and that a recovery was not up ahead, in the near-term, to eliminate the large deficit. This suggests Yale senses the U.S. economic recovery -- and the college revenue snap-back it implies -- will not occur in 2009.

Disclosure: I've used Yale University's library and related resources for research over the years.