The État Refugi of Lac Champlain is a massive, environmentally stunning nation, remarkable for its state-planned economy, devotion to social welfare, and stringent health and safety legislation. The compassionate, democratic, devout population of 1.594 billion Lac Champlainians are fiercely patriotic and enjoy great social equality; they tend to view other, more capitalist countries as somewhat immoral and corrupt.

The government — a sprawling, bureaucracy-choked, socially-minded morass — juggles the competing demands of Welfare, Spirituality, and Healthcare. The average income tax rate is 76.4%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The sizeable but stagnant Lac Champlainian economy, worth 9.97 trillion marks a year, is driven entirely by a combination of government and state-owned industry, with private enterprise illegal. The industrial sector, which is quite specialized, is led by the Book Publishing industry, with significant contributions from Tourism, Uranium Mining, and Retail. Average income is 6,257 marks, and distributed extremely evenly, with practically no difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Military funding has been stripped back, criminals lock themselves in their mums' basements to avoid prison, the combined alert sound of a nation simultaneously receiving a text message is a common cause of hearing damage, and the installation of street lights across remote goat tracks has left citizens bemused. Crime is totally unknown, thanks to a very well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Lac Champlain's national animal is the swan, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests.

Lac Champlain is ranked 783^rd in the world and 6^th in Refugia for Most Income Equality, scoring 98.87 on the Marx-Engels Emancipation Scale.