The United Kingdom of Aetsveld-Aalstad is a massive, efficient nation, ruled by Benjamin II van Aetsveld-Aalstad with a fair hand, and renowned for its irreverence towards religion, punitive income tax rates, and devotion to social welfare. The compassionate, democratic population of 3.646 billion Aetsveld-Aalstedelingens are free to do what they want with their own bodies, and vote for whomever they like in elections; if they go into business, however, they are regulated to within an inch of their lives.

The enormous government juggles the competing demands of Administration, Education, and Healthcare. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Aalstad-stad. The average income tax rate is 90.7%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The frighteningly efficient Aetsveld-Aalstadian economy, worth 358 trillion klinkels a year, is highly specialized and mostly made up of the Information Technology industry, with significant contributions from Book Publishing and Basket Weaving. State-owned companies are reasonably common. Average income is 98,387 klinkels, and distributed extremely evenly, with little difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Kids looking for shark teeth have become ancient history, Benjamin II van Aetsveld-Aalstad is strangely popular with male politicians' wives, surrogate mothers are encouraged to refer to their wombs as 'rental space', and turnstile jumpers grow up to be tax cheats. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Aetsveld-Aalstad's national animal is the Aetsvelder-Lionmouthbird, which soars majestically through the nation's famously clear skies, and its national religion is Aalanianism.

Aetsveld-Aalstad is ranked 15,660^th in the world and 836^th in Osiris for Largest Publishing Industry, scoring 9,187.6 on the Bella Potter Productivity e-Index.