MORE confident employers in the United States stepped up job creation in April, expanding payrolls by 290,000, the most in four years. The jobless rate rose to 9.9 percent as Americans streamed back into the market looking for work.

The hiring of 66,000 temporary government workers to conduct the census helped overall payroll growth last month. However, private employers the backbone of the economy boosted jobs, too. They added a surprisingly strong 231,000 positions last month, also the most since March 2006, the US Labor Department said yesterday.

"Clearly companies have a newfound confidence in the future of the economic recovery and on the part of their own business prospects," said Joel Naroff, president of Naroff Economic Advisors. "The broad-based job gains are an indication that businesses are feeling more comfortable about expanding their work forces."

The jobless rate rose from 9.7 percent in March to 9.9 percent in April, mainly because 805,000 job seekers perhaps feeling better about their prospects resumed their searches for work.

Many economists have predicted the unemployment rate would rise as people come back into the labor force. The jobless rate hit 10.1 percent in October, a 26-year high. The rate could climb back up to the 10 percent range in the months ahead, Naroff said.

Yesterday employment report sketched out a picture of a healing jobs market and an economy picking up momentum in the early spring. The improvements, however, were taking place before the stock market plunged this week on concerns that the European debt crisis could spread. There are fears the crisis could make firms more cautious about hiring in the future, economists warned.