Jobless Claims Grow for Week

Initial jobless claims increased by 20,000 last week, the Labor Department said Thursday.

The decline put claims for the week ended Saturday at 457,000, higher than the 442,000 projected by economists, Bloomberg reported. It compares with a revised 437,000 from the prior week.

The four-week moving average, a less volatile measure, rose to 456,000, from 454,000 the week before.

Continuing claims for the previous week ended Oct. 23 dropped by 42,000 from a week earlier, to 4.34 million.