In a recent study, the respected national Institute of Medicine estimated that $750 billion is lost each year to wasteful or excessive healthcare spending. This sum includes excess administrative costs, inflated prices, unnecessary services and fraud — dollars that add no value to health and well-being. Frederick J. Zimmerman, professor and chair of the department of health policy and management at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, and colleagues outline some of the myriad ways that $750 billion could benefit Americans. The authors of the study propose that more than $410 billion per year — or 55 percent of the savings — could be returned to the private sector for individuals and companies to use as they please; another $202 billion (27 percent) could go toward deficit reduction, yielding a greater reduction than the congressional “super committee” sought and failed to achieve. An additional $104 billion (14 percent) could support additional investments in human capital and physical infrastructure according to a recent report at www.universityofcalifornia.edu.