Gary Sheldon Fields (born October 1, 1946[1]) is an American economist, the John P. Windmuller Professor of International and Comparative Labor and Professor of Economics at Cornell University.
In 1978 he moved to Cornell University as associate professor of industrial and labor relations, becoming full professor in 1982 and being endowed with the John P. Windmuller Chair of International and Comparative Labor in 2008.
At Cornell University he has been director of the ILR International Initiative (1991–94) and of the Program on Globalization and the Workplace (2007–10) as well as chairman of Department of Labor Economics and the Department of International and Comparative Labor.
[9] His most-cited research article, published in 1975, analyzes the unemployment and underemployment in least developed countries in a quantity adjustment framework by making extensions to the Harris-Todaro model of rural-urban migration, namely (1) allowances for more generalized job search behavior, an urban traditional sector, preferential hiring by educational level, and labor turnover considerations.
A predicted unemployment rate much lower than in the initial model and more in line with empirical observations is the result of these modifications, explaining the appeal of Fields' labor market model in development economics.