The number of Americans filing first-time claims for unemployment benefits dropped last week for the third straight week, government data revealed Thursday.

In the week ending Sept. 19, initial claims sat at 530,000, a decrease of 21,000 from the previous week's revised figure of 551,000, the U.S. Department of Labour said.

Susan Bredeken, right, talks with Wendy Morisi about employment opportunities at a job fair earlier this month, in Romulus, Mich. (Paul Sancya/Associated Press)

Existing jobless claims also fell by a more-than-expected 123,000, to sit at 6,138,000 for the week ending Sept. 12.

Wisconsin, Oregon and Kansas saw the largest increases in initial claims, while claims fell by the largest amount in Texas, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Massachusetts.

Layoffs slowing

The data suggested layoffs are continuing to slow in the U.S. and that a recovery — however modest — might be underway. Declining job losses "would be an important sign of improvement … lessening the critical threat to consumer spending — and to the overall economy — represented by falling employment," said Pierre Ellis, an economist at Decision Economics, in a commentary.

On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve said spending "remains constrained by ongoing job losses," tight credit and declining house prices. But the economy has "picked up" and it expected to see signs of strengthening.

Trends in first-time claims are widely viewed by economists as a sign of the willingness of companies in the overall economy to hire new workers, and claims below 400,000 would be a signal that employers are adding to the net total of jobs.

With files from Bloomberg.com