U.S. added 386,000 more jobs than originally reported WASHINGTON - The government went back over its numbers and found something missing - nearly 400,000 new jobs. In its annual revision to employment data, the Labor Department said Thursday that 386,000 more jobs were created in the year that ended in March than it originally had reported. The revision came as the Labor Department reported initial claims for unemployment insurance fell sharply last week to 359,000, down 26,000 from the previous week's adjusted level. It was the lowest number of new claims since the week that ended July 21, when 357,000 people filed, and brought the figures near the level consistent with strong job growth. The new data on total jobs for the fiscal year was culled from state unemployment insurance tax records. It showed the economy added 453,000 additional private sector jobs. The result is there were 133.25 million people employed in nonfarm jobs at the end of March instead of 132.86 million, or about 0.3% more than originally thought. Over the last 10 years, the so-called annual benchmark revision has been plus or minus 0.3% of the workforce. "Maybe things are better than we think," Rupkey said, noting that the figures meant the economy, on average, added more than 30,000 additional jobs each month during that period than initially thought. The biggest jobs gains were 145,000 in trade, transportation and utilities; 99,000 in leisure and hospitality; and 85,000 in construction. Manufacturing produced 25,000 fewer jobs than originally reported. A quarterly survey of large-company chief executives released Thursday by the Business Roundtable showed more pessimism about the direction of the economy. Only 29% of the CEOs said they would add workers in the next six months, down from 36% the previous quarter. About a third of the CEOs - 34% - said they expected to cut jobs in the next six months.