An amendment to the 2024 finance bill was voted on overnight from Saturday to Sunday by senators. The latter concerns a potential future “taxe streaming” whose main objective would be to finance theNational Music Center(CNM). Don't panic though,this does not directly concern citizens as was the case for the TV license, but we could be directly impacted by this decision. As a reminder, the contribution to public broadcasting was eliminated in 2022.
Free contribution is not enough
It had previously been agreed with the various streaming platforms to set up a voluntary contribution. Thus, donations from services such as Apple Music,YouTube Music,Deezeror evenSpotifywere supposed to avoid the streaming tax. This unfortunately did not allow the CNM to reach the amounts necessary for its operation.
As a reminder, theNational Music Centeris a public organization which was created in 2020. It was designed to consolidate and strengthen the support provided to the music sector in France. It works in particular for better equity in the distribution of resources by financing talented artists from all sides.
The main signatory organizations of the project, which are mainly part of the music sector in France, welcomed the Senate vote. Among them we find theUnion of independent French phonographic producers(UPFI), leCurrent music union(SMA), or even theNational union of musical and variety shows PRODISS.
An increase in subscriptions to be expected
On the platform side, the atmosphere is not the same. The ESML union, which notably represents the platformsSpotifyetDeezer, believes that such a tax could generatean increase in subscriptions of around 10%. Finally, we could see in this streaming tax an indirect means of forcing French subscribers to the various services to participate in the financing of theNational Music Center.
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