The Republic of The Higa is a mammoth, orderly nation, notable for its spontaneously combusting cars. The hard-nosed, hard-working, cynical population of 8.088 billion Higans are rabid consumers, partly through choice and partly because the government tells them to and dissenters tend to vanish from their homes at night.

The medium-sized, pro-business, well-organized government juggles the competing demands of Law & Order, Defense, and Education. Citizens pay a flat income tax of 14.8%.

The strong Higan economy, worth 389 trillion guilders a year, is broadly diversified and led by the Book Publishing industry, with significant contributions from Uranium Mining, Information Technology, and Woodchip Exports. Average income is 48,099 guilders, but there is an enormous disparity between incomes, with the richest 10% of citizens earning 256,604 per year while the poor average 4,738, a ratio of 54.2 to 1.

The latest Harry Potter book is a bestseller, citizens are barcoded to keep track of their movements, organ donation rates are among the lowest in the region, and a signed affidavit from a prominent anti-corruption advocate declares that she is in fact a crook after all. Crime is a problem. The Higa's national animal is the penguin, which can occasionally be seen avoiding garbage in the nation's murky oceans.

The Higa is ranked 145,592^nd in the world and 6^th in Guinea Kiribati for Most Developed, scoring 55.91 on the Human Development Index.