Employment in US increases most in 4 yrs

Employment in the US increased in April by the most in four years and the unemployment rate unexpectedly rose as thousands of people entered the labour force, indicating the recovery is becoming self-sustaining.

Payrolls jumped 290,000 last month, more than the median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News, after a revised 230,000 increase in March that was larger than initially estimated, figures from the Labor Department in Washington showed today. The April gain included 66,000 temporary workers hired by the government to help conduct the 2010 census and a 231,000 rise in private payrolls.

Companies such as General Electric Co are boosting staff as sales improve, leading to income gains that may spur consumer spending and more hiring. At the same time, unemployment may take time to recede as Americans who had dropped out of the workforce resume the job hunt, one reason why the Federal Reserve says it will keep interest rates low.

“The private sector is improving and job growth is picking up,” Julia Coronado, a senior US economist at BNP Paribas in New York, said before the report. “The job growth will be enough to keep us on a pretty decent growth track.”

Manufacturers added the most workers to payrolls since August 1998, employment at service-providers rose the most since November 2006 and construction companies hired for a second straight month. The gain in overall employment in April was the biggest since March 2006.