A job seeker speaks with recruiters from The Home Depot at a RecruitMilitary veterans job fair in Cleveland.

The number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits rose from a 43-year low last week, but remained below a level that is consistent with a tightening labor market.

Initial claims for state unemployment benefits increased 18,000 to a seasonally adjusted 251,000 for the week ended Nov. 19, the Labor Department said on Wednesday.

Claims for the prior week were revised to show 2,000 fewer applications filed than previously reported.

Claims have now been below 300,000, a threshold associated with a healthy labor market, for 90 straight weeks. That is the longest run since 1970, when the labor market was much smaller.

Economists polled by Reuters had forecast first-time applications for jobless benefits rising to 250,000 in the latest week. The claims report was released a day early because of the Thanksgiving holiday on Thursday.

A Labor Department analyst said there were no special factors influencing last week's data and that no states had been estimated. The four-week moving average of claims, considered a better measure of labor market trends as it irons out week-to-week volatility, fell 2,000 to 251,000 last week.