Location: Westphalia

Overview • People • Government • Economy • Trend • Analysis

The Defender Duchy of Charles of Burgundy is a massive, economically powerful nation, remarkable for its devotion to social welfare. Its hard-working, intelligent population of 2.499 billion are effectively ruled by a group of massive corporations, who run for political office and provide their well-off citizens with world-class goods and services. Their poorer citizens, however, are mostly starving to death while being urged to go out and get real jobs. The populace has reasonably extensive civil rights, although these are mostly aimed at allowing them to buy whatever they like.

The government -- a sprawling, bureaucracy-choked morass -- juggles the competing demands of Social Welfare, Healthcare, and Religion & Spirituality. Citizens pay a flat income tax of 31%. A powerhouse of a private sector is led by the Tourism, Information Technology, and Soda Sales industries.

Rupert Bear is considered to be the most risqué TV programme in Charles of Burgundy, teenagers across the country are celebrating the defeat of a national curfew bill, schoolchildren have twice-weekly sex education classes, and 'unconventional' weaponry has been banned. Crime is moderate, and the police force struggles against a lack of funding and a high mortality rate. Charles of Burgundy's national animal is the Magical Unicorn, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests, its national religion is Roman Catholicism, and its currency is the Pound Sterling.

Charles of Burgundy is ranked 8th in Westphalia and 68,506th in the world for Largest Insurance Industry, scoring -1 on the Risk Expulsion Effectiveness Rating.

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NationStates by Max Barry, author of and