Australia mulls tax on Meta, Google and TikTok to fund newsrooms

U.S. critics argued that Australia’s legislation is disproportionately costly to American corporations, noting that all targeted platforms are American.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese argued that a monetary value should be attached to journalists' work and that investment in journalism is critical to a healthy democracy, stating that content produced by journalists should not be solely captured as value for large multinational platforms.

Meta rejected the proposal, calling it a government-mandated transfer of wealth and arguing it would function as a digital services tax that does not reflect the value of news content. Google rejected the need for the tax, saying it ignores changes in the ad market and would arbitrarily exclude other platforms. TikTok did not respond to requests for comment.

The Australian government released draft legislation proposing a 2.25% levy on the Australian-revenue of Meta Platforms, Google, and TikTok for not striking commercial deals with news publishers. The plan includes offsets for platforms that pay publishers for journalism and a distribution method based on the number of journalists employed by news organisations. The bill is to be presented to Parliament by July 2, with an estimated annual raise of AUD 200-250 million.

In 2021, Australia passed the News Media Bargaining Code to pressure platforms to pay for Australian news content. Platforms chose to sign commercial agreements rather than face arbitration, but they have since avoided renewing those deals by removing news from their services.