Location: Funen

Overview • People • Government • Economy • Trend • Analysis

The Pingu of Pingau is a colossal, safe nation, ruled by Lord Pingo with a fair hand, and notable for its national health service. Its compassionate, intelligent population of 9.797 billion love a good election, and the government gives them plenty of them. Universities tend to be full of students debating the merits of various civil and political rights, while businesses are tightly regulated and the wealthy viewed with suspicion.

It is difficult to tell where the omnipresent government stops and the rest of society begins, but it devotes most of its attentions to Education, with areas such as Defence and Commerce receiving almost no funds by comparison. It meets every day to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Pingu. The average income tax rate is 44%, but much higher for the wealthy. 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 study of medicine is popular throughout Pingau, citizens are encouraged to report friends, family members or co-workers who seem depressed to the government for "counselling", anti-government political posters adorn every building like wallpaper, and national parks have long lines of different gender-specific 'Porta-Pottys'. Crime -- especially youth-related -- is totally unknown, thanks to the all-pervasive police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Pingau's national animal is the penguin, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests, and its currency is the Fish.

Pingau is ranked 25th in Funen and 91,327th in the world for Shortest Average Lifespan, scoring -22 on the Bus Surprisal Index.

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NationStates by Max Barry, author of and