WASHINGTON, March 31 (Xinhua) -- Initial jobless claims in the United States last week ticked up to 202,000, after falling to the lowest level in decades, the U.S. Labor Department reported on Thursday.

       In the week ending March 26, the number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits increased by 14,000 from the previous week's upwardly revised level of 188,000, according to a report released by the department's Bureau of Labor Statistics.

       The latest jobless claims report also showed that the number of people continuing to collect regular state unemployment benefits, which runs a week behind the headline numbers, decreased by 35,000 to 1.3 million. That number peaked in April and May in 2020, when it was over 20 million.

       The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs - state and federal combined - for the week ending March 12 also decreased by 81,975 to nearly 1.78 million.

       The weekly jobless claims figure came one day after payroll data company Automatic Data Processing (ADP) reported that private companies in the United States added 455,000 jobs in March.

       "Businesses are hiring, specifically among the service providers which had the most ground to make up due to early pandemic losses," said Nela Richardson, chief economist at the ADP.

       "However, a tight labor supply remains an obstacle for continued growth in consumer-facing industries," Richardson said.

       The crucial monthly employment report is scheduled to be released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday, which will include employment data from both the private sector and the government.

       Diane Swonk, chief economist at major accounting firm Grant Thornton, said in a recent blog that the March unemployment rate is expected to fall to 3.7 percent, a new pandemic low and only slightly above the 3.5 percent pace in February 2020.