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The German government is creating a 10% tax plan for global internet giants such as Meta and Google in a move that could further drive cross-Atlantic trade tensions.
Wolfram Weimer, Germany’s Federal Secretary of Media and Culture, told Stern Magazine on Thursday that the new government is drafting digital collections on a global internet platform, but alternatives such as the voluntary commitment by the affected tech companies to pay more taxes in Germany are still under consideration.
German Prime Minister Friedrich Merz’s Left Coalition of Centres agreed to “assess” taxes on internet platforms in the treaty, signed in early May, and agreed that revenues should be used to enhance the country’s media landscape.
“We’re taking this seriously,” the former editor of Die Welt, owned by Axel Springer, said in an interview. Weimer added that he invited “Google leadership and leadership of key industry personnel” to host discussions over tax alternatives “including the possibility of voluntary commitments.”
German taxes on Google, Meta and other US internet giants could put an additional strain on transatlantic trade relations when US President Donald Trump has accused American companies of unfair treatment and wanting to impose tariffs in response.
However, Weimer was eager to such a prospect and pointed out that the new German government has launched a legal basis for establishing taxes. He said the obligation could focus on German ad revenues for digital platforms such as Google and Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, and could reach 10%.
“We’re preparing a concrete draft law,” Weimer said, adding that it is based on the Austrian model. He praised it as “a simple and effective tax of 5% on online advertising services of very large platform operators.” Weimer stressed that the actual tax rate could be high in Germany, noting that a double tax rate is considered “medium and legal” by the German government.
Several other EU countries, including France, already have taxes on digital companies.
Facebook and Google did not respond immediately to requests for comment.
German media organizations, including federal digital publishers and newspaper publishers, praised Weimer’s initiative and informed the German Newswire DPA that they welcomed the internet giant to “take responsibility.”
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The Free Press Media Association, another lobby group, urged the Merz government to redistribute revenue from taxes to the editorial team’s media organization, highlighting the dramatic pressure that their business model is under on global technology platforms.
Weimer told Stern that taxes should be applied to all high-tech platforms that generate “billions of revenue” in Germany and use editorial and cultural content created by others.
The Austrian experience has not caused a “significant price change” to such ad revenue, but “meaning that their enormous profit margins have been reduced slightly as companies ultimately made a small tax contribution to society,” Weimer added.
