White House economist Jason Furman told CNBC that September's jobs report is good news even though it shows the pace of job creation had slowed.
The chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisors said numbers in the labor force should actually be falling due to an aging population, but instead, they are rising — a promising reflection of the strength of the economy.
The worse-than-expected jobs report showed the creation slowing to 156,000 nonfarm jobs last month and unemployment edging up slightly to 5 percent. Economists had expected 176,000 new jobs.
In an interview on "Squawk on the Street," Furman said that despite job losses in the manufacturing sector and headwinds from slowing global trade growth, "wages are up at a 2.8 percent annual rate so far this year. We've seen more wage growth since 2012 than we did in the entire period from 1980 to 2007."
He said he and his colleagues are seeing exactly what they want in terms of continued job growth.