However, in a way, the elderly solve that problem for us. They are a large proportion of the population and they are much better at voting, which means they vote to protect the state pension, healthcare and social support they receive. So that means taxes go up.
You'd certainly think so, but we're stuck with two generations' of elders who grew up huffing leaded gas fumes and having Cold War fascist propaganda shoved down their throats, who spent their teen and young adult years carpet bombing their neural pathways with ditch weed, LSD, and cocaine, and got themselves addicted to Fox News right around the age cognitive decline sets in.
Also...
Let's imagine fascists took over the US federal government. Implicitly, this means at least approximately half the country backed the fascists, so that's how bad it is at the start point. It's unlikely the non-fascists all agree the fascists need to be resisted: a load of them will be too afraid, or think they can follow the laws and systems and prep for the next election, so the non-fascists will be disunified, cautious and indecisive.
This is then where the fascists slowly boil the frog. Gradually soften or erode any forms of resistance: disrupt or disempower resisting state governments, cripple opposition media, suborn the police and courts, establish strong additional power bases outside the state etc (e.g. their own party militia or secret police). Eventually maybe enough non-facsists realise they need to fight... and it's way too late because the systems, networks and resources they needed in order to do so effectively are already gone.
Yeah, I hate to break it to you but the fascist takeover happened decades ago, during the Truman and Eisenhower years. That was the whole purpose behind the Nazi sympathizers and war profiteers who suddenly found themselves in power after the war, imported and employed any Nazi with a degree they could get their hands on, who didn't have to be immediately thrown under the bus for war crime. What we've seen since
is the "boiling the frog" period; it just took nearly 80 years to reframe the ideology, adjust strategy, and manufacture consent. In order of what you described...
Divide-and-conquer the opposition started with the Red Scare and pervasive anti-communist propaganda. Dismantling electoralism started by undermining the primary system ('68 was the capstone), eliminating campaign finance regulation (Citizens United was just the capstone), and reforming voting blocs around racial issues (civil rights and the Southern Strategy) and negative partisanship. Meanwhile, we had the union-busting and anti-union propaganda of the post-Carter years.
Not to mention aggressively hunting and dismantling would-be resistance groups under surveillance programs, starting with COINTELPRO with a direct through-line to today -- post-9/11 federal surveillance and suppression of anti-Bush protesters and protest groups, the Obama admin and federal law enforcement collaborating with the financial and private security sectors to crack down on OWS, federal responses to BLM protests.
Cooperative federalism alone was enough to dismantle and disempower state governments; increasingly federalized law enforcement, especially after 9/11, was one aspect. The other was attaching federal mandates and riders to funding distributed from the federal government to the states, making several state governments themselves dependent on federal funding to operate. Post-Obama focus on taking over local and state governments, and gerrymandering to maintain decisive majorities, was practically an afterthought.
Crippling opposition media? No need, eliminating the Fairness Doctrine and passing the '96 telecoms act did all the work. Why actively suppress opposition media when it can be bought out by oligarchs (such as Bezos and WashPo) or multi-national media conglomerates, and then buried in a tidal wave of toxic "mainstream" sludge to the point it has very little to no reach outside progressive echo chambers?
Suborning police and courts? Why do you need to suborn police forces when they already agree with you, as the entire professional field is naturally-inclined towards right-wing authoritarianism? Do I need to remind you modern policing in the US originated from slave patrols, nativist gangs, and private security companies reorganized and directed by ex-military? Post-Reagan and post-9/11 police militarization was, once again, practically an afterthought. Eradicating juridical democracy was a generational issue, brought to fruition by decades' worth of neoliberal court-stacking.
Strong power bases outside the state? Exactly what do you think the Federalist Society, Cato Institute, Heritage Foundation, US Chamber of Commerce, and American Legislative Exchange Council are there to do?
Then we had the militias and the Klan before them, and still have far-right militant groups...even though they've gone to ground, for now. Not that there's need, because once again refer to what I said about cops -- ghost skinning is real, far more pervasive than it was under the original Bush-era report, and to a certain extent normalized now with the likes of Kash Patel and Pam Bondi in the upper echelons of government.