The United Shelties of Tristerra is a mammoth, socially progressive nation, ruled by the people with a fair hand, and renowned for its national health service, soft-spoken computers, and stringent health and safety legislation. The compassionate, democratic, cheerful population of 7.479 billion Tristans 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 large, liberal, socially-minded, outspoken government juggles the competing demands of Welfare, Education, and Healthcare. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of New Shetland. The average income tax rate is 87.3%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The frighteningly efficient Tristan economy, worth a remarkable 1,074 trillion treats 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 Tourism industry, with major contributions from Information Technology, Book Publishing, and Beef-Based Agriculture. Average income is an impressive 143,613 treats, and distributed extremely evenly, with practically no difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Knitters are arrested for carrying needles in their bags, prisons in Tristerra are the summer homes of murderers, the government has spent days debating the merits of a petition calling for a ban on sporks, and advertisements for jobs in the sciences run in fashion magazines. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown. Tristerra's national animal is the shetland sheepdog, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests, and its national religion is unconditional love.

Tristerra is ranked 29,104^th in the world and 3^rd in Dexter for Highest Average Incomes, with 143,613.27 Standard Monetary Units.