The Federation of Laurentrum is a huge, cultured nation, remarkable for its museums and concert halls, barren, inhospitable landscape, and compulsory military service. The hard-nosed, hard-working, cynical population of 386 million Laurentians are kept under strict control by the oppressive government, which measures its success by the nation's GDP and refers to individual citizens as "human resources."

The medium-sized, corrupt, moralistic, well-organized government juggles the competing demands of Law & Order, Defense, and Education. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Laurynth. Citizens pay a flat income tax of 36.2%.

The frighteningly efficient Laurentian economy, worth 39.4 trillion Laurels a year, is broadly diversified and led by the Information Technology industry, with major contributions from Arms Manufacturing, Book Publishing, and Door-to-door Insurance Sales. State-owned companies are common. Average income is an impressive 102,121 Laurels, with the richest citizens earning 8.4 times as much as the poorest.

Every spring railroad foundations erode to reveal human remains, telling someone to 'break a leg' is considered a criminal inducement to self harm, students who do not recite the national anthem each morning have to drop and give their teacher 50, and citizens have an obligation to remain silent and anything they say may be used against them. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Laurentrum's national animal is the North Laurentian Double-headed Eagle, which teeters on the brink of extinction due to toxic air pollution.

Laurentrum is ranked 49,888^th in the world and 980^th in The East Pacific for Most Advanced Public Education, scoring 4,355.45 on the Edu-tellignce® Test Score.