Location: Balder

Overview • People • Government • Economy • Trend • Analysis

The Unified States of Alvalero is a massive, safe nation, ruled by Zander with a fair hand, and remarkable for its keen interest in outer space. Its hard-nosed, hard-working, intelligent population of 4.228 billion have some civil rights, but not too many, enjoy the freedom to spend their money however they like, to a point, and take part in free and open elections, although not too often.

It is difficult to tell where the omnipresent government stops and the rest of society begins, but it juggles the competing demands of Education, Law & Order, and Defence. It meets every day to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Ankara. The average income tax rate is 75%, and even higher for the wealthy. A powerhouse of a private sector is led by the Arms Manufacturing industry, followed by Tourism and Uranium Mining.

Voting is compulsory, the elderly live on a steady diet of canned beans in dreary government housing, students abandon classrooms for online education, and the latest Harry Potter book is a bestseller. Crime -- especially youth-related -- is totally unknown, thanks to the all-pervasive police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Alvalero's national animal is the White Wolf, which teeters on the brink of extinction due to widespread deforestation, its national religion is Norse Mythology, and its currency is the Alvaleran dollar.

Alvalero is ranked 367th in Balder and 14,380th in the world for Largest Trout Fishing Sector, scoring 3 on the Nemo Depletion Efficiency Index.

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NationStates by Max Barry, author of and