The Dominion of Birwood is a small, genial nation, remarkable for its irreverence towards religion, devotion to social welfare, and stringent health and safety legislation. The democratic population of 20 million Birwoodians are fiercely patriotic and enjoy great social equality; they tend to view other, more capitalist countries as somewhat immoral and corrupt.

The large, socially-minded government juggles the competing demands of Welfare, Education, and Defense. The average income tax rate is 54.2%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The basket case Birwoodian economy, worth 215 billion pounds 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 dominated by the Trout Farming industry, with significant contributions from Tourism, Uranium Mining, and Automobile Manufacturing. Average income is 10,752 pounds, and distributed extremely evenly, with practically no difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Birwood's national animal is the unicorn, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests.

Birwood is ranked 284,077^th in the world and 389^th in Talonia for Largest Publishing Industry, scoring -10.39 on the Bella Potter Productivity e-Index.