Tomorrow morning, when the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports the unemployment rate for March, don’t be surprised if it’s very low. I predict that it will be not much more than 4 percent and maybe even less. But that statistic will not really tell you much about the unemployment rate in March.

Here’s why. As the BLS explains on its web site:

Each month, highly trained and experienced Census Bureau employees contact the 60,000 eligible sample households and ask about the labor force activities (jobholding and job seeking) or non-labor force status of the members of these households during the survey reference week (usually the week that includes the 12th of the month).

Almost all the layoffs happened after March 14.

But the unemployment rate for April that will be reported on May 1, which, ironically, is known as International Workers Day? OMG!