Rachel Connelly started teaching at Bowdoin in 1985, after completing her Ph.D. in Economics for the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Since then she has also held positions of NSF/ASA Fellow at the U.S. Census Bureau, 1988-89, and Visiting Professor at People's University, Beijing PRC, Fall 1991-Fall 1992 and Peking University, Institute for Population Research, Spring 1991, and Fall 1998 through Fall 1999.
Connelly's area of research is at the intersection of demographics and labor markets. She has published articles on the effect of broad demographic trends on the labor market decisions and on the economics of child care. Her research on child care considers both sides of the market -- the demand for child care on the part of families with young children, the labor supply of child care workers, employers use of child care as an employment benefit, and parental child caregiving time. Her most current research on child care, joint with Jean Kimmel, looks at the caregiving time of parents using the American Time Use Survey (ATUS). Recent articles on times use by Connelly and Kimmel have been published in the Journal of Human Resources, Review of Economics of the Household and Eastern Economics Review. In addition, Connelly and Kimmel have written a monograph, Time Use of Mothers in the United States at the Turn of the 21st Century, published by W. E. Upjohn Press.
Published Reseach（excerpts）：
―Gender Differences in Unpaid Time Use by Family Structure,‖ with Jean Kimmel, in Family Economics: How Households Impact Markets and Economic Growth, Esther Redmount, editor (Santa Barbara, CA:ABC-CLIO, forthcoming).
―The Role that Children’s Education Plays in the Migration Decisions of Chinese Rural Women,‖ with Ken Roberts and Zhenzhen Zheng, Journal of Contemporary China, 21(73), January 2012, 93-111.
―The Settlement of Rural Migrants in Urban China—Some of China’s Migrants Are Not ―Floating‖ Anymore,‖ with Ken Roberts and Zhenzhen Zheng, Journal of Chinese Economic and Business Studies, 9(3), August 2011, pages 283-300.
―The Role of Nonstandard Work Status in Parental Caregiving for Young Children,‖ with Jean Kimmel, Eastern Economics Journal 37(2), Spring 2011, 248-269.
―Childcare, Eldercare, and Labor Force Participation of Urban Women in China: 1982-2000,‖ with Margaret Maurer-Fazio, Chen Lan, and Lixin Tang. Journal of Human Resources 46(2), Spring 2011, 261-294.
Time Use of Mothers in the United States at the Beginning of the 21st Century, with Jean Kimmel. Kalamazoo: W. E. Upjohn Institute Press, 2010.
―Changes in the Pattern of China’s School Enrollment Rates between 1990 and 2000‖ with Zhenzhen Zheng, in Investing in Health and Education for Economic Development in China. Edited by Gordon Liu, Shufang Zhang, and Zongyi Zhang, World Scientific Publishing, 2010. (Expanded version of ―Enrollment and Graduation Patterns as China’s Reforms Deepen, 1990-2000‖,2007.)
―The Impact of Migration on the Position of Women in Rural China‖ with Kenneth Roberts, Zhenzhen Zheng and Zhenming Xie, Feminist Economics, January 2010, 16(1), 3-41.
―Spousal Influences on Parents’ Non-Market Time Choices‖ with Jean Kimmel, Review of Economics of the Household, 2009, 7(4), 361-394.