Jobless claims tumble to lowest in 4 years

Beck Diefenbach / Reuters

Michael Johnson looks for warehouse work online at the Employment Development Department of California service office in San Francisco in this file photo.

By msnbc.com staff and news wires

New claims for unemployment benefits tumbled to their lowest since 2008, government data showed Thursday.

The Labor Department reported that seasonally-adjusted claims dropped 6,000 to 357,000 in the week ended March 31. The four-week moving average, considered a more accurate gauge of labor market trends, dropped 4,250 to 366,000. That measure also hit its lowest in four years and has shed about 13 percent in the past six months.

Thursday's report has no direct relationship to the March employment report due on Friday.?But it could bolster the case that the pace of healing in the labor market is lowering the need for the Federal Reserve to do more to boost growth.

Economists polled by Reuters expect the employment report will show the U.S. economy added 203,000 jobs last month, notching up a fourth straight month of job growth. That would mark the longest stretch of monthly employment gains topping 200,000 since 1999.

"The claims data are consistent with modest job growth in March," said economist Yelena Shulyatyeva of BNP Paribas.

Shulyatyeva, who foresees an increase in non-farm payrolls Friday of about?200,000, also?expects the unemployment rate to remain at 8.3 percent.?"We are still on track for solid growth going forward, but we expect some moderation. It's telling us there'll be less firing going on. The acceleration in job growth will happen when there's more hiring going on, which we haven't seen yet," she said.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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