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More Americans than forecast filed applications for unemployment benefits last week, a sign the improvement in labor-market conditions may be stalling.

Jobless claims fell by 2,000 to 386,000 in the week ended April 14 from a revised 388,000 the prior period that was higher than initially estimated, Labor Department figures showed today in Washington. The median forecast of 47 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News called for a drop to 370,000. Revisions to previous data have been larger than normal and the government is trying to determine the cause, a Labor Department spokesman said as the figures were released to the press.

The claims figures raise the possibility the payroll gains that have helped push unemployment down to a three-year low may cool, weighing on consumer spending. Federal Reserve officials, awaiting evidence of a more robust job market and economic growth, have said they

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The outlook among U.S. homebuilders dimmed in April after six months of rising or steady confidence. The decline suggests the housing market remains weak despite modest gains.

The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo said Monday that its builder sentiment index fell this month to 25 from 28. Last month’s reading was the highest since June 2007. The index rose for five straight months between September and February.

Builders expressed weaker confidence in sales over the next six months. A separate gauge measuring that outlook rose for six straight months before falling this month, from 35 to 32.

The housing industry has a long way to go in its slow recovery. Any reading below 50 indicates negative sentiment about the housing market. The index hasn’t reached hit that level since April 2006, the peak of the housing boom.

“What we’re seeing is essentially a pause in what had been a fairly rapid build-up in builder confidence that started last September,” said David Crowe, chief economist with the homebuilders’ group. “This is partly because interest expressed by buyers in the past few months has yet to translate into expected sales activity.”

The spring buying season got an early start thanks to a mild January and February, which made up the best winter for sales of previously occupied homes in five years. Permits to build houses and apartments rose in February to their highest level since 2008.

Yet home prices continued to fall this winter. Builders keep slashing their prices to stay competitive. Last year was the worst for new-home sales on records dating back to 1963.

Builders are struggling to compete with foreclosures, which have forced down prices of previously occupied homes. And many people are finding it hard to qualify for loans or meet higher required down payments.

Low appraisals are scuttling some deals after contracts have been signed. As a result, some people who want to buy a new house are holding off because they can’t sell their home.

Those in a position to buy are benefiting from lower prices and the cheapest mortgage rates on record. The average rate on the 30-year fixed mortgage is hovering near record lows below 4 percent.

Builders have pointed to some regional pockets of strength. New Orleans, Pittsburgh and other smaller areas of Texas, in particular, have reported increased buying.

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The raspberry-colored walls are up — as is the large “American Girl” sign with stars dotting the “i”s.

When the highly-anticipated store opens later this week in Chesterfield Mall, lines of devoted fans are expected to snake outside the store as they wait to buy $100 dolls. But many parents haven’t waited for the grand opening to book children’s birthday parties there, with reservations already scheduled for several months out.

The store’s arrival — and the diehard following it brings along — is being welcomed with open arms by Chesterfield Mall. The shopping center has struggled in recent years with declining sales and a lower occupancy rate than many other area malls.

Katie Reinsmidt, spokeswoman for CBL & Associates, the mall’s owner, said the mall has already been moving in a positive direction this year with a rise in both traffic and sales.

“I think things are turning the corner,” she said.

And the American Girl store can’t do anything but help bring more visitors and buzz, she added.

“Other retailers at the center are anticipating some additional traffic — it will definitely have some cross benefit,” she said. “There’s nothing like it in the mall today.”

That’s what Angie Sicard hopes. Her specialty toy store, Toy Tyme, caters to both girls and boys.

“Families are going to spend so much on girls (at American Girl), that the boys are going to want something, too,” she said. “So they are going to come to our store” or other retailers in the mall.

Wade Opland, American Girl’s vice president of retail, said retailers near new American Girl stores usually see a double-digit sales lift regardless of whether it’s a cookie store or clothing store.

“We’re like the Apple of girls business for a mall,” he said, referring to the high traffic and sales that Apple brings to mall-based stores. “That’s why we’re so sought after.”

Whereas most mall stores pull from an area of about 20 miles, American Girl stores draw customers from a 150 to 200-mile radius, Opland said.

The Chesterfield store is one of three stores American Girl will open this year; the other two slated to open later this year are in Miami and Houston.

But while the retailer, which began as a direct-to-consumer catalog company, has been growing its bricks-and-mortar footprints in recent years, it doesn’t expect to have more than 20 stores nationwide, Opland said. The Chesterfield store is American Girl’s 12th store nationwide and will be the retailer’s only store in Missouri.

The retailer was drawn to Chesterfield Mall for its “premier” mix of stores and because it is in the midst of a growing community with many young families, Opland said.

“Part of our strategy is we want to put these stores where mom, girls, and families live,” he said guaranteed pay day loans. “At Chesterfield Mall, we’re in a prime location where mom can see us and it has a plethora of parking.”

The 10,850 square-foot store, which has an exterior entrance to the mall, is going into the space formerly occupied by the restaurant Wapango.

CBL’s Reinsmidt said Chesterfield Mall has a great location in an area with attractive demographics.

“But Chesterfield had unfortunate luck going into the recession,” she said. “Pretty much anytime a national bankruptcy announcement was made, there was one of those stores at Chesterfield.”

Borders and The Sharper Image are two examples. And some retailers — such as Abercrombie & Fitch, which shuttered its store in Chesterfield Mall earlier this year — have been paring back their number of mall stores nationwide, she said.

In late 2009, the mall began inviting local artists to fill some empty spaces in the mall as part of Artropolis — similar to ailing Crestwood Court’s now mostly-defunct ArtSpace.

By the end of 2011, Chesterfield Mall’s store space was 93 percent leased, up from 84 percent in 2007, according to CBL’s annual report.

But even though it has fewer vacancies, the mall’s sales per square foot in those mall stores (not including anchors) dropped 17 percent to $270 during that same time period. By comparison, sales per square feet at other CBL malls in the area range from $475 at West County Center to $400 at St. Claire Square to $364 at South County Center.

Reinsmidt said one of the challenges for Chesterfield Mall is that there is a lot of space to fill — nearly 500,000 square feet of store space not including anchors. That is more than any of CBL’s other four malls in the region.

And when the mall’s previous owner, Westfield, refurbished the mall in a $71 million project in 2006, it added more store space with a wing that includes the movie theater, food court, stores and restaurants like the Cheesecake Factory.

“They expanded the small shop space rather than contracting it,” she said.

With so much space, many of Chesterfield’s stores are a bit larger than in other malls, which lowers the mall’s sales-per-square-foot number, she said.

“The stores are really profitable and have great volumes,” she said.

As some stores leave, new tenants continue to come to the mall. Francesca’s Collections opened in the last week or so. And Monsoon, a London-based children’s retailer, is planning to open a store there this summer.

And, of course, there is American Girl. It plans a “soft” opening on Wednesday followed by a grand opening celebration on Saturday and Sunday.

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Global financial regulators have failed to create clear standards for banks, meaning lenders are hoarding cash instead of providing loans needed to drive growth, European Banking Federation President Christian Clausen said.

President Obama made a broad push Tuesday for increasing taxes on the wealthy and in particular proposed Buffett Rule.

His address to college students in Florida came on the heels of a White House report that laid out its case, arguing that the Buffett Rule would make the tax code fairer and make it harder for the very rich to lower their tax bills.

Quiz: What the rich really pay in taxes

"What drags our entire economy down is when the benefits of economic growth and productivity go only to the few … and the gap between those at the very, very top and everybody else keeps growing wider and wider," Obama said.

The Buffett Rule is a key talking point in Obama’s re-election bid. The general principle behind it is that millionaires and billionaires like investor Warren Buffett shouldn’t pay a lower percentage of their income in federal taxes than middle-class households.

Obama has even set a threshold for how much they should pay: At least 30% of their income.

Obama’s Buffett Rule: FAQ

Most millionaires today already pay a higher percentage of their income in federal taxes than the vast majority of all Americans. But roughly 25% of them end up with a lower effective tax rate than 10% of middle-income households, according to the Congressional Research Service.

And a very small number — fewer than 1,500 households in 2009, according to the IRS — end up owing no federal income tax at all.

Obama’s Buffett Rule is targeted specifically at those high-income households that are in a position to structure their income and engage in legal tax strategies to minimize their tax bite.

Millionaires who owe no federal income tax

"The idea behind the Buffett Rule is to have a tax on high-income earners who manage to avoid paying a large share of their income in taxes," Alan Krueger, director of the president’s Council of Economic Advisers, said in a call with reporters.

They can do so if much of their income comes from capital gains and dividends — which are taxed at a lower rate than ordinary paychecks. The same is true if they have made tax-free or tax-sheltered investments.

And a number of other tax breaks on the books end up disproportionately benefiting high-income households.

Krueger asserted that the Buffett Rule would also make for good tax policy by making the tax code more efficient. That is, there would be less incentive for the wealthy to choose one investment or financial activity over another or to recharacterize their income simply to reduce their tax bills.

Tax experts, however, say the goals of the Buffett Rule could be accomplished more simply through a complete overhaul of the tax code.

Indeed, Obama initially proposed the Buffett Rule as a guiding principle for reform. But Senate Democrats are now pushing a bill to implement a version of the rule in today’s tax code. And the White House is now endorsing that push.

Tax reform is likely to be a long slog, and implementing a Buffett Rule now would be a "simple and common sense" step toward reform, said Jason Furman, the principal deputy director of the National Economic Council. 

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Concerns about the economy pushed oil prices lower on Monday.

West Texas Intermediate, the U.S. benchmark crude, gave up 85 cents to end at $102.46 per barrel. Brent crude, which is used to price oil imported by U.S. refineries, fell by 76 cents to finish at $122.67 per barrel.

The U.S. economy added just 120,000 jobs in March _ half as much as each of the previous three months. The government reported the disappointing data on Friday, but Monday was the first day oil markets could react. Stocks also fell.

Analysts said the slower pace of hiring could be a symptom of a weakening economy. It also hints at a slowdown in gasoline usage.

Iran also weighed on oil markets. OPEC’s No. 2 oil producer agreed to hold talks about its nuclear program with the West starting Friday. That eased fears of a prolonged standoff that could further squeeze world oil supplies. Already, international sanctions have forced some of the biggest importers of Iranian oil to find other sources.

Renewed negotiations could lead to an agreement that lifts those sanctions. The talks also reduce the risk, for now, that Iran will try to choke off exports from other oil producers by closing shipping routes out of the Persian Gulf guaranteed approval cash loans.

Concerns about a prolonged standoff with Iran have added about $13 to $14 to the price of a barrel of oil, independent analyst Jim Ritterbusch said. Oil should fall further if Iran works with the West, although Ritterbusch expects the price to remain elevated “for months to come.”

“As long as the regime stays in place, the nuclear threat is always going to be there,” he said.

In the U.S., gasoline prices fell by about a penny over the weekend to $3.927 per gallon, according to auto club AAA, Wright Express and Oil Price Information Service. Pump prices have eased after nearing $3.94 a gallon last week.

Experts still say that prices could peak this month between $4.25 and $4.35 per gallon.

In other energy trading, heating oil fell by 2.33 cents to $3.1459 per gallon while gasoline futures fell by 4.38 cents to finish at $3.2967 per gallon. Natural gas added 1.8 cents to end at $2.107 per 1,000 cubic feet.

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The man polls say has the best shot at becoming France’s next president wants to hire thousands more teachers, renegotiate Europe’s expensive, hard-won bailout package, and re-assess his country’s role in both Afghanistan and NATO.

But Socialist Francois Hollande appeals less for his platform than for his persona: the innocuous, intellectual everyman is many things that conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy is not.

Hollande, 57, is tapping into a French zeitgeist wary of international finance, weary of Sarkozy’s “bling-bling” personality and eager for change. While countries in struggling Europe shift to the right, France may hand the presidency to the left for the first time in a generation, with repercussions for the continent’s direction and France’s future.

Part of Hollande’s appeal is his Mr. Nice Guy image, but he still must convince voters that he’s got what it takes to run a complex, nuclear-armed nation and one of the world’s biggest economies.

Hollande isn’t the only leftist making headlines in this campaign: Firebrand far-left candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon has amassed some of the biggest crowds so far at rallies blanketed in red communist flags. Melenchon, with the charisma that the mainstream Hollande lacks, is complicating the political calculus.

French voters kick off the balloting in two weeks, with 10 candidates from across the political spectrum facing off in a first-round vote on April 22 that will winnow the race down to two.

While Hollande has slipped a little in recent weeks, polls have suggested for months that he would win the expected two-man finale against Sarkozy on May 6 by a broad margin.

The economic crisis in Europe has felled many governments in recent years. A Hollande victory could break from a recent rightward trend in the continent, and put France out of step with other big European countries like Germany, Spain, Britain and Poland _ all run by center-right or conservative leaders. Italy, hobbled by a debt crisis, is led by technocrat Mario Monti.

Some of Hollande’s major proposals could raise eyebrows abroad: As governments enact austerity measures elsewhere in Europe, he wants to hire thousands more teachers. He wants to scrap a European bailout package led by Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel. He has pledged to pull all French combat troops out of Afghanistan by year-end, and says that pledge would be the first thing he tells allies at a NATO summit in Chicago in May.

For many in France, the time seems ripe for a return to a Socialist president: the only one in postwar France was Francois Mitterrand, from 1981 to 1995; throw-the-bums-out has been an election theme in Europe; Sarkozy, in part for reasons of personal style, has been unpopular for years; and the financial crisis and debt crises in Europe have emboldened the left.

Hollande is seen as more of a consensus manager and a listener than visionary. For much of his tenure as party first secretary from 1997 to 2008, he served mostly as a water carrier for party elders _ and only now is coming into his own.

His advisers insist to a foreign reporter that Hollande is no old-school Socialist, but a social democrat wary of the economic challenges coming from 21st-century powers like China and India.

Yet while major parties of the left in Europe reformed and tacked toward the political center in recent years _ like Gerhard Schroeder’s Socialists in Germany, or Britain’s Labour party under Tony Blair, the Socialists in France eschewed such a move.

And when he speaks to the French faithful, Hollande’s class-warfare style rhetoric _ inveighing against the financial world that he calls his “adversary”, and demanding justice for the underclass _ often draws cheers.

Hollande, who once quipped “I don’t like the rich” on TV, got a recent boost in the polls after he announced a proposal to slap a 75-percent tax on income beyond the first (EURO)1 million ($1.3 million) earned each year.

Hollande on Wednesday drew thousands who spilled out of two warehouses at a convention center near the city of Rennes, in the heart of the left-leaning region of Brittany.

The highlight was Hollande’s appearance alongside Segolene Royal, his longtime partner and mother of his four children. Royal, who is also Socialist, was the party’s nominee in 2007 _ and lost handily to Sarkozy payday advance. Hollande and Royal split not long after that election.

On stage, Hollande and Royal appeared just seconds together, and the body language was uncomfortable: they clasped hands from a distance, and smiled to the cheering throng. But the message _ party unity _ was clear. His new romantic partner, political journalist Valerie Trierweiler, looked on from a seat in the crowd.

Hollande’s near 90-minute speech covered his platform: A focus on education, job support for French youths facing high jobless rates, equal pay for women, respect for culture and ethnic diversity. Sarkozy has structured his campaign on a theme of a “strong France.”

Hollande claimed that Sarkozy, who took office promising economic growth, fiscal responsibility and competitiveness in France, had failed on all _ and promised more responsible Socialist leadership.

“People say to us, ‘Watch out, the left is back, it’s going to empty the (state) coffers.’ It’s already happened! ‘Watch out, if the left is back, it’ll raise the debt’. It’s already happened! ‘The Left will hurt competitiveness’ _ It’s already happened,” he thundered. “Well, we’ll do the opposite.”

The rich, he said, will be asked to pay more, and more money will be redistributed “to allow France to pick itself up.”

Unlike Sarkozy rallies, where a preppier crowd often hoists tricolor French flags in abundance, the Rennes gathering mostly brought out young students and retirees.

His campaign has been textbook: He launched a 60-point platform months ago, hewing to many Socialist tenets. At times, he comes across as stiff and cautious, but has made no big gaffes.

Hollande’s biggest challenge has been to try to project presidential caliber. While his pedigree is top-tier as a graduate of the Ecole National d’Administration _ the French breeding-ground school for both political and corporate elites like former President Jacques Chirac _ he has never run a government ministry.

Under his tenure as party boss, the Socialists suffered one of the biggest shockers in recent French political history: Lionel Jospin lost the first round to far-right nationalist Jean-Marie Le Pen in the 2002 presidential race, later won by Chirac. Hollande calls it the biggest blow of his career and one he won’t soon forget.

Hollande was born in the Normandy city of Rouen, the son of a social-worker mother who he admired and a doctor father who backed the political right and whose ideas “forced me to construct my ideas,” Hollande writes in his campaign-season book entitled “Changer de Destin” (Change Destiny).

On Les Guignols de l’Info, a satirical fake news show with puppets, Hollande has long been depicted as innocent, wide-eyed and soft-in-the-middle _ with a dopey, hollow laugh.

But in the Sarkozy era, he’s tapped into frustration about unemployment and perceived economic inequality. While Sarkozy, a former hard-charging Interior Minister, has trotted out his longtime formula of playing up his security credentials, Hollande has focused on what polls show worry the French most: joblessness and the economy.

The body language at the lectern _ where both Sarkozy and Hollande can excel _ speaks volumes. Hollande often leans on his elbows, or flails his arms about in the air, and laughs. Sarkozy cuts the air in crisp movements, and is seemingly less about engaging his audience than displaying resoluteness.

People who have known Hollande for years say his human touch and his assiduousness _ often unseen _ at the ground game of politics set him apart.

“What you notice most about Francois is that he’s well-balanced, has integrity, and feels good about himself,” said Frederic Bourcier, the Socialist Party’s First Secretary in the region around Rennes, alluding to the image of Sarkozy as hasty, tempestuous and aggressive. “We need something new.”

He also said Hollande had reworked himself, with an image makeover ahead of the campaign that included trimming his midsection, and that could serve as an inspiration for the country.

“This guy is tailor-made for France nowadays,” Bourcier said.

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