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.