Pasadena, CA -- (SBWIRE) -- 05/05/2011 -- The first time applications for unemployment benefits went up last week for the third straight week and hit a three-month high.

There were 429,000 initial claims for the week ending April 23, an increase of 25,000 from the previous week. The figure surprised economists who were expecting it to be around 390,000. For the job market to be considered in a good shape, economists believe that the jobless claims should be below 400,000 consistently. The economy also needs to add 150,000 to 200,000 jobs every month just to keep up with the population growth.

The seasonally adjusted continuing claims dropped by 68,000 to 3.64 million. This was the lowest figure since September 2008. But some analysts said that it could also be a result of long term unemployed Americans dropping out of the system.

Although jobs are not being created at a high enough rate, smaller companies are adding far more employees this year than in 2010.

Companies with less than 500 employees have added around 188,000 jobs every month this year. In 2010, these companies added on average around 68,500 jobs a month.

EmploymentCrossing CEO A. Harrison Barnes says that even though most of the data says that the jobs being created are paying fewer benefits, there are plenty of jobs being created. Barnes’s firm has been able to find over 415,000 jobs in the last seven days. The main sectors are healthcare (91,000+), managerial (57,000+), information technology (49,000+), and retail (49,000+).