Location: Lazarus

Overview • People • Government • Economy • Trend • Analysis

The Benevolent Dictatorship of Laerod is a gargantuan, safe nation, ruled by Andrew Lasius with an iron fist, and renowned for its ban on automobiles. Its compassionate, cynical population of 16.079 billion are ruled with an iron fist by the dictatorship government, which ensures that no-one outside the party gets too rich. In their personal lives, however, citizens are relatively unoppressed; it remains to be seen whether this is because the government genuinely cares about its people, or if it hasn't gotten around to stamping out civil rights yet.

It is difficult to tell where the omnipresent, socially-minded government stops and the rest of society begins, but it juggles the competing demands of Education, Social Welfare, and the Environment. It meets every day to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Cascade. The average income tax rate is 100%. The private sector is almost wholly made up of enterprising ten-year-olds selling lemonade on the sidewalk, although the government is looking at stamping this out.

The government seizes private property for the 'good of the people', libraries are now installed with jacuzzis and mini-bars, heavy industry must go to expensive lengths to dispose of waste, and most of the nation's wealthy aristocrats are dentists. Crime is totally unknown, thanks to the all-pervasive police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Laerod's national animal is the raven, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests, and its currency is the tarad.

Laerod is ranked 2,428th in Lazarus and 75,020th in the world for Happiest Citizens, scoring 10 on the Relative Cheerfulness Rating.

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NationStates by Max Barry, author of and