During the first year of COVID-19, there weren't enough high-quality masks to protect health care workers. Without help at the federal level, hospitals that could hoarded masks, while other hospitals competed against each other to buy what was available. This drove the prices of masks much higher and hurt the budgets of hospitals, states, insurance companies and individuals across the U.S. What policy-making challenge does this event best illustrate? Benefits vs. harms Federalism Tragedy of the commons Balance of interests.