I'm not trying to be combative; I genuinely don't know.
This feels obvious - of course it works like that, until your paper sizes aren't using this ratio (which the US ones don't) and then the frustration is apparent.
Like the fact that the aspect ratio chosen allows manufacturers to just use one base sheet and then subdivide it into smaller page sizes is convenient for manufacturers, but it's not a necessary property for scaling the contents of the page.
Same for printing two copies per page (2-up). With a 1:√2 ratio, you can perfectly fit two copies of something side-by-side on the same paper size. This was incredibly common back when I was at school, where A4 worksheets were printed 2-up on A4 paper so that each individual one was A5 in size (half the area, √2/2 the length). With A4, you then just chop the printed pages in half and the worksheet fits perfectly. With any other aspect ratio, either there'd be wasted space due to the different aspect ratio of the chopped-in-half paper to the original, or you'd have to print 4-up on larger paper and chop it into quarters. The 1:√2 aspect ratio of ISO paper sizes means you can just chop a page in half and get the same aspect ratio, and that's useful to people doing printing, not just manufacturers.
But if you really think it’s important, then you can consider a series of sizes like tabloid, letter, and memo to be equivalent to A3, A4, and A5. Each is exactly half the area of the previous, and can be had by dividing the larger size in half along the longer side.
This seems like you entirely missed the thread? The whole point is that this actually works for the A-series and in your made up US series it can't work because the ratio is wrong.