A new government report shows employers added more jobs in January while previous jobs gains were pushed higher, but those for trucking were modest.

According to the U.S. Labor Department, 257,000 jobs were added last month, while total jobs gains in December were revised upward to 329,000 from 252,000. The November figure was also revised upward to 423,000 from 353,000, the highest level in 17 years. Over the past three months more than a million jobs have been added.

The January figures beat Wall Street expectations, only the second time this has happened in the past 11 years, according to Reuters.

The report said the job gains occurred the most in retail trade, construction, health care, financial activities and manufacturing.

It also showed for-hire trucking contributed just 2,400 job additions to the overall January figure. The broader transportation and warehousing sector shed 8,600 jobs. The December trucking figure was revised upward to 11,900 from an originally reported 7,300 increase.

Despite the overall job additions, the unemployment rate inched upward from 5.6% in December to 5.7% in January, as more Americans looked for work, with the labor force participation rate increasing 0.2% of a percent to 62.9%, though still near a 30-year low.

Average hourly earnings rose 0.5% in January, more than offsetting the 0.2% decline at the end of 2014 and pulling the year-over-year growth rate up from 1.9% to 2.2%.

“While hardly an upward trend, the January report does paint a more favorable picture of wages in this country, said Sterne Agee Chief Economist Lindsey Piegza. “Still from the Federal Reserve’s point of view, one month's data point hardly instills confidence that wages are on the rise after years of stagnation at 1.9% annual growth.”

She said while headline job creation remains positive, particularly against the backdrop of strong positive revisions to fourth quarter hiring.

“Still, the January number leaves something to be desired as we remind our readers the U.S. labor market needs on average 200,000 to 250,000 jobs on a monthly basis just to cover population and demographic change,” Piegza said. “We remain cautiously optimistic looking out to February and March and beyond, to confirm the ‘rising trend’ many analysts were quick to assign to this morning's 0.5% monthly increase in wages.

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Despite the increased overall job numbers there are also critics who say the unemployment rate is nothing more than a “big lie.”

According to Jim Clifton, CEO of the polling organization Gallup, the unemployment rate is “extremely misleading.”

In a blog post written Tuesday, he said the Labor Department counts someone as employed if they are working a part-time job but desire a full-time job, and those who are not employed, but haven’t looked for a job in the last four weeks aren’t considered unemployed, but rather out of the job force.