Location: The East Pacific

Overview • People • Government • Economy • Trend • Analysis

The Constitutional Monarchy of Aethelstania is a massive, cultured nation, ruled by King Tostig IV with a fair hand, and remarkable for its sprawling nuclear power plants. Its hard-nosed, hard-working, intelligent population of 2.094 billion hold their civil and political rights very dear, although the wealthy and those in business tend to be viewed with suspicion.

It is difficult to tell where the omnipresent, liberal government stops and the rest of society begins, but it concentrates mainly on Education, although Healthcare and Social Welfare are secondary priorities. It meets every day to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Winchester. The average income tax rate is 30%, but much higher for the wealthy. A powerhouse of a private sector is led by the Book Publishing industry, followed by Information Technology and Pizza Delivery.

Voting is voluntary, truth is often impossible to tell from fiction on the evening news, euthanasia is illegal, and traffic jams are a common sight due to construction work from a massive overhaul of the nation's freeways. Crime -- especially youth-related -- is a problem, and the police force struggles against a lack of funding and a high mortality rate. Aethelstania's national animal is the Lion, which teeters on the brink of extinction due to widespread deforestation, and its currency is the Denarii.

Aethelstania is ranked 4,028th in The East Pacific and 91,567th in the world for Largest Trout Fishing Sector, scoring -4 on the Nemo Depletion Efficiency Index.

Preview

NationStates by Max Barry, author of and