A day before the release of the closely watched monthly jobs report, the Labor Department released a report on Thursday showing that first-time claims for U.S. unemployment benefits unexpectedly increased in the week ended February 27th.
The report said initial jobless claims rose to 278,000, an increase of 6,000 from the previous week's unrevised level of 272,000.
The modest increase came as a surprise to economists, who had expected jobless claims to edge down to 270,000.
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