[quote=Aecetia]”The Supreme Court upheld most of President Obama’s Health Care law, including the controversial individual mandate that nearly all Americans obtain health insurance or be subject to a fine. The court said that fine ultimately amounts to a tax, and therefore the government does have the power to impose it.”
“The Anti-Injunction Act applies to suits ‘for the purpose of restraining the assessment or collection of any tax.’… Congress, however, chose to describe the ‘[s]hared responsibility payment’ imposed on those who forgo health insurance not as a ‘tax,’ but as a ‘penalty.’ …There is no immediate reason to think that a statute applying to ‘any tax’ would apply to a ‘penalty.’”
Congress’s decision to label this exaction a ‘penalty’ rather than a ‘tax’ is significant because the Affordable Care Act describes many other exactions it creates as ‘taxes.’”
….
The Affordable Care Act does not require that the penalty for failing to comply with the individual mandate be treated as a tax for purposes of the Anti-Injunction Act. The Anti-Injunction Act therefore does not apply to this suit, and we may proceed to the merits.”
The court applied two different tests to determine whether the penalty is a tax under two different powers. It is not a tax for the purposes of the Anti-Injunction act, and is a tax under the taxing powers of congress.
In the same ruling, it was judged to be both a tax and not a tax.