The number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits increased last week, the government said Thursday, but remained at levels consistent with a strengthening labor market. The Labor Department reported that initial claims for state unemployment benefits rose 9,000 to a seasonally adjusted 269,000 for the week ended November 28. It was the thirty-ninth straight week that jobless claims held below 300,000, which normally is associated with a healthy labor market. Claims are near levels last seen in 1973 and there is little room for further declines as the labor market normalizes. The four-week moving average of claims, considered a better measure of labor market trends as it strips out week-to-week volatility, fell 1,750 to 269,250 last week.
