The Empire of Stephen is a mammoth, efficient nation, renowned for its barren, inhospitable landscape and spontaneously combusting cars. The hard-working population of 7.394 billion Stephenians enjoy some of the most opulent lifestyles in the region, unless they are unemployed or working-class, in which case they are variously starving to death or crippled by easily preventable diseases.

The tiny, pro-business government juggles the competing demands of Healthcare, Administration, and Welfare. Citizens pay a flat income tax of 6.5%.

The very strong Stephenian economy, worth 438 trillion rubles a year, is driven almost entirely by the private sector, which is fairly diversified and led by the Soda Sales industry, with major contributions from Information Technology, Woodchip Exports, and Cheese Exports. Average income is 59,299 rubles, but there is a large disparity between incomes, with the richest 10% of citizens earning 281,355 per year while the poor average 7,375, a ratio of 38.1 to 1.

A cat may look at a king and a dude can look at an ass, politicians can't accept birthday presents from their own children, drivers regularly pull over for nonexistent police cars, and only the fast and the furious are brave enough to drive. Crime, especially youth-related, is a serious problem, with the police force struggling against a lack of funding and a high mortality rate. Stephen's national animal is the kiwi, which can occasionally be seen sifting through garbage in the nation's cities.

Stephen is ranked 112,713^th in the world and 1^st in Empire for Most Scientifically Advanced, scoring 88.32 on the Kurzweil Singularity Index.