By David Lawder

WASHINGTON, Feb 1 (Reuters) - A Bush administration official acknowledged that the U.S. economy has slowed since the White House's latest official growth forecast in November, but he declined to say how that would affect budget deficit estimates to be released on Monday.

Phillip Swagel, U.S. Treasury assistant secretary for economic policy, told a news briefing that recent weak economic data, including Friday's announcement that U.S. payrolls shrank by 17,000 jobs, indicate a slowing economy.

"Certainly we look at the data, and certainly the economy has slowed some since we last put out our official projections," Swagel said, adding that he did not have a new estimate for U.S. growth this year.

The Office of Management and Budget said last week its November growth forecast for 2008 of 2.7 percent would remain the same when the budget is released on Monday. That forecast will underlie the budget projections.

Analysts participating in the latest Blue Chip Economic Indicators survey released on Jan. 10 projected 2008 growth of 2.2 percent -- but the survey was taken ahead of a surprisingly weak jobs report released earlier in the month and a separate report that showed factory activity stalling.

Swagel acknowledged that the more recent private-sector forecasts now showed lower growth than the White House projection.

"In a sense that only confirms what I'm saying about what's happened from November to January, that the data that have come out have certainly showed the economy has slowed over that period."

He also declined to say how the slowdown would affect government revenue and deficit projections, but noted that "economics affect revenues, and I'm sure that will be something that's discussed next week."