The Empire of BALLYDESMOND is a tiny, efficient nation, renowned for its compulsory military service and irreverence towards religion. The hard-nosed, hard-working, cynical population of 10 million BALLYDESMONDians are rabid consumers, partly through choice and partly because the government tells them to and dissenters tend to vanish from their homes at night.

The tiny, pro-business, well-organized government juggles the competing demands of Law & Order, Defense, and Healthcare. Citizens pay a flat income tax of 7.4%.

The very strong BALLYDESMONDian economy, worth 684 billion DABLOONS a year, is driven almost entirely by the private sector, which is fairly diversified and led by the Gambling industry, with major contributions from Basket Weaving, Information Technology, and Door-to-door Insurance Sales. Average income is 68,450 DABLOONS, but there is a significant disparity between incomes, with the richest 10% of citizens earning 214,992 per year while the poor average 16,686, a ratio of 12.9 to 1.

Crime is moderate. BALLYDESMOND's national animal is the CATS, which can occasionally be seen sifting through garbage in the nation's cities.

BALLYDESMOND is ranked 297,036^th in the world and 233^rd in Lesbian for Largest Welfare Programs, scoring 90.61 on the Safety Net Mesh Density Rating.