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“You Can't Stop Progress”

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The Republic of Thing 4 is a colossal, safe nation, renowned for its vat-grown people, compulsory vegetarianism, and compulsory military service. The compassionate, democratic, humorless, devout population of 3.534 billion Thing 4ians are fiercely patriotic and enjoy great social equality; they tend to view other, more capitalist countries as somewhat immoral and corrupt.

The enormous, socially-minded government juggles the competing demands of Administration, Defense, and Education. The average income tax rate is 71.2%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The thriving Thing 4ian economy, worth 274 trillion dollars a year, is driven entirely by a combination of government and state-owned industry, with private enterprise illegal. However, for those in the know, there is a large, well-organized, quite specialized black market in Arms Manufacturing, Information Technology, Soda Sales, and Tourism. The private sector mostly consists of enterprising ten-year-olds selling lemonade on the sidewalk, but the government is looking at stamping this out. Average income is 77,747 dollars, and distributed extremely evenly, with practically no difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

Commuters are denied boarding for attempting to bring packed lunches onto trains, blind dates tend to result in bruised shins, the ruling party has a devil of a time keeping order in the ranks, and the right to free speech is being drastically curtailed. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a capable police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Thing 4's national animal is the sheep, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests.

Thing 4 is ranked 15,357^th in the world and 4^th in Distorted Memories for Most Eco-Friendly Governments, scoring 3,995.31 on the Dolphin Recycling Awareness Index.