The Free Land of Phodopus is a very large, environmentally stunning nation, renowned for its museums and concert halls, absence of drug laws, and punitive income tax rates. The compassionate, democratic population of 205 million Phodosians 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, liberal, socially-minded government juggles the competing demands of Administration, Education, and Welfare. The average income tax rate is 78.2%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The sizeable but inefficient Phodopusian economy, worth 10.5 trillion Cricets a year, is driven entirely by a combination of government and state-owned industry, with private enterprise illegal. The industrial sector, which is highly specialized, is dominated by the Trout Farming industry, with significant contributions from Information Technology, Beef-Based Agriculture, and Basket Weaving. Average income is 51,422 Cricets, and distributed extremely evenly, with practically no difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Elementary school children develop thousand-yard stares, voting district maps are said to resemble a tyrannosaurus eating the capital, no one believes anything until it has been strenuously tested and peer-reviewed, and cyber-crime and tin-foil hat sales are both increasing at record rates. Crime is totally unknown, thanks to a capable police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Phodopus's national animal is the Prairie Vole, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests.

Phodopus is ranked 15,703^rd in the world and 520^th in The North Pacific for Largest Welfare Programs, scoring 3,629.6 on the Safety Net Mesh Density Rating.