From a Politico article, September 2009:
In the most contentious exchange of President Barack Obamas marathon of five Sunday shows, he said it is not true that a requirement for individuals to get health insurance under a key reform plan now being debated amounts to a tax increase.
But he could look it up in the bill.
Page 29, sentence one of the bill introduced by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont) says: The consequence for not maintaining insurance would be an excise tax.
And the rest of the bill is clear that the Finance Committee does, in fact, consider it a tax: The excise tax would be assessed through the tax code and applied as an additional amount of Federal tax owed.
@ Sec. 9001\4980I IRC (page 793)
SEC. 9001. EXCISE TAX ON HIGH COST EMPLOYER-SPONSORED HEALTH COVERAGE.
SEC. 4980I. EXCISE TAX ON HIGH COST EMPLOYER-SPONSORED HEALTH COVERAGE.
It's a tax and it was known all along that it was a tax.