Status: 16.01.2024, 14:17 PM
By: Lars-Eric Nievelstein
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Actually, the plastic tax was supposed to start at the beginning of the year. The German government still needs time for implementation. The new levy is not scheduled to come into force until 2025.
Berlin – Anyone who was already expecting the plastic tax this year can breathe a sigh of relief. In a press release from the beginning of January, the federal government led by Olaf Scholz (SPD) said that it still needed time to find an "efficient solution with as little bureaucracy as possible". The new deadline is January 1, 2025. Billions are at stake.
€1.4 billion plastic tax for the EU
The German government has been paying the plastic levy to the European Union (EU) since it was introduced in 2021. In total, the sum of this levy amounted to around 2021.2022 billion euros in 1 and 4. Now, instead, these costs are to fall on the companies that put the plastic into circulation. The federal government saves money by passing on the costs of plastic use to the polluters.
The German government says that the plastic tax will not come into force until 2025. More time is needed for an efficient design. © IMAGO / Pond5 Images
However, it is to be feared that the affected companies will simply pass on the additional costs incurred in this way to the customers. In practice, this could happen through price increases for the products in question.
80 cents per kilogram – The plastic tax at a glance
Here's how it works: About 80 cents are charged per kilogram of non-recyclable packaging waste. According to EU rules, states must decide how they want to pay this levy. To do this, they can either take funds from their regular budget or immediately introduce a scheme that puts the costs on the polluters.
At that time, the German government had decided to pay the levy from the state budget – at least until now. With a sum of 1.4 billion euros, it can be assumed that the Federal Republic of Germany had paid about 1.7 million euros for non-recyclable plastic waste.
Cost of plastic tax for consumers
How expensive the plastic tax will actually be in the end depends, among other things, on the amount to which the plastic manufacturers pass on the tax imposed on them to customers. "Plastic manufacturers are reducing their profits and thus offsetting the new levy. Taxes or levies are not necessarily passed on 1:1," the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action said on X in December.
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If a 1:1 transfer is to take place, a look at one's own plastic consumption must be made. Every year, the average German produces 38 kilograms of plastic waste. In this case, the additional costs due to the plastic tax would amount to about 30.4 euros.
Environmental Pollution or Money-Making – Plastics Associations Voice Criticism
On the part of the associations of the plastics industry, there was clear criticism regarding the plastic tax. "The postponement of the plastic tax to 2025 gives the federal government time to improve the steering effect of the tax," explains Ingemar Bühler of Plastics Europe Germany to the Association of Plastics Producers. In his opinion, a unilateral tax on plastic packaging would by no means have the desired steering effect. Packaging manufacturers could simply switch to other materials and thus avoid the levy without benefiting the environment.
The government is less concerned with protecting the environment than with collecting money. The tax would have to be material-neutral if it were really about a steering effect. Instead, the government must create incentives to use more non-fossil raw materials. "For example, from biomass and CO₂." Bühler cites an adjustment of the German deposit system or the eco-modeled license fees as more efficient alternatives to the plastic tax.