“If this tax on American companies is enacted, it would be at odds with the Turnberry Agreement, in which the European Union committed to ‘address unjustified digital trade barriers’ — not erect new ones,” Greer said.
The criticism follows scrutiny by Republicans in Washington of a similar Canadian streaming law requiring tech platforms to financially support domestic cultural production. House Republicans in March introduced legislation seeking a U.S. trade investigation into Canada’s Online Streaming Act, arguing it unfairly targets American companies and could justify retaliatory tariffs.
Germany’s proposed law would require streaming companies and broadcasters to invest at least 8 percent of their annual German revenues into domestic and wider European film and television production, or face financial penalties. Berlin also announced plans to nearly double public support for local productions to €250 million.
Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil defended the overhaul in February, saying it would create “planning certainty for more investment in national and international productions” and send “a clear signal” for Germany’s media industry and “cultural diversity.”
Netflix has pushed back. “If regulation ultimately makes it harder to invest in ambitious projects and, as a result, fewer titles are produced overall, that benefits neither audiences nor the production location,” Wolf Osthaus, Netflix’s senior global affairs director in Germany, told AFP.
The dispute opens another front in increasingly strained U.S.-German relations after Merz accused Washington in April of having been “humiliated” by Iran, and U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the withdrawal of 5,000 U.S. troops from Germany at the beginning of May.
John Hewitt Jones contributed to this report.