This study used the 2005 Chinese General Social Survey (CGSS) to investigate nonagricultural employment in rural China. With China moving away from collective agriculture, rural households have begun to act as the basic unit of production, which has allowed some peasants to leave their family farms and join the paid labor force or participate in the flourishing private businesses. The first model applied logistic regression at the individual level to estimate the employment probabilities in agricultural versus nonagricultural sectors by married men versus married women. The second model was conducted at the couple level to estimate the likelihood of four nonagricultural employment outcomes: both spouses, neither spouses, husband, or wife. Both models confirmed positive correlations between education and nonagricultural employment. Women’s employment was more responsive to the presence of grandparents and young children in the household, with the former effect interacting with grandparents’ ages. The male employment privilege did not significantly affect the gender division in career within the family. The results also indicated that the employment pattern within the family was closely related to market factors such as the geographical location of the village, the economic developmental features, and the conditions of the labor force. In addition, better nonagricultural employment opportunities existed in the Eastern and Central regions than in the Western regions.