After reporting initial jobless claims at their lowest level in almost seven years in the previous week, the Labor Department released a report on Thursday showing that claims rebounded slightly in the week ended April 12th. The Labor Department said initial jobless claims inched up to 304,000, an increase of 2,000 from the previous week's revised level of 302,000. Economists had expected jobless claims to climb to 315,000 from the 300,000 originally reported for the previous week. Even with the upward revision, the number of jobless claims in the previous week was still at the lowest level sitting hitting a matching figure in the week ended September 22, 2007. The report also showed that the less volatile four-week moving average fell to 312,000, a decrease of 4,750 from the previous week's revised average of 316,750. With the decrease, the four-week moving average fell to its lowest level since hitting 302,000 in the week ended October 6, 2007. Continuing claims, a reading on the number of people receiving ongoing unemployment assistance, also fell to 2.739 million in the week ended April 5th from the previous week's revised level of 2.750 million. The four-week moving average of continuing claims also dropped to 2,785,250, a decrease of 32,500 from the previous week's revised average. Continuing claims hit their lowest level since December of 2007, while the four-week moving average hit its lowest level since January of 2008. Peter Boockvar, chief market analyst at the Lindsey Group, said, "From the perspective of the firing's side of the labor market equation, the current level is encouraging as economic activity normalizes after a tough few months." "We do though still await a break out to well above 200,000 in the monthly pace of job creation, which has been elusive so far in this recovery," he added. Earlier this month, the Labor Department released a separate report showing that non-farm payroll employment rose by 192,000 jobs in March compared to economist estimates for an increase of about 200,000 jobs. At the same time, the report also showed that employment in January and February increased by 144,000 jobs and 197,000 jobs, respectively, reflecting a net upward revision of 37,000. Despite the continued job growth, the unemployment rate held unchanged at 6.7 percent in March. Economists had expected the unemployment rate to dip to 6.6 percent.