D. Gale Johnson

David Gale Johnson (July 10, 1916 – April 13, 2003) was an American economist and an expert on Russia and China. Among other notable contributions to economics, Johnson concluded that the strength of an industry depends on how the market works and not so much on government actions. In the mid-1940s, a group of agricultural economists led by Schultz and Johnson moved to the University of Chicago. Johnson served as department chair from 1971 to 1975 and 1980-1984 and was president of the American Economics Association in 1999. Their research in farm and agricultural economics was widely influential and attracted funding from the Rockefeller Foundation to the agricultural economics program at the university. Among the graduate students and faculty affiliated with the pair in the 1940s and 1950s were Clifford Hardin, Zvi Griliches, Marc Nerlove, and George S. Tolley.

In 2000, he received the Quantrell Award.