First floor vs ground floor, usage origin

Question

Ground floor – First floor:

In British English, the floor of a building which is level with the ground is called the ground floor. The floor above it is called the first floor, the floor above that is the second floor, and so on.
  In American English, the floor which is level with the ground is called the first floor, the floor above it is the second floor, and so on.

(Collins COBUILD English Usage)

Though there are exceptions to the above-mentioned usage,( and exceptions are not the issue here)   in public buildings in the U.S., for instance,  it’s also possible to call the street-level floor the ground floor, like in Britain, but  how come that in the UK and Europe  the ground level floor  and the first floor are  respectively  referred to as the first floor and  the second floor in the U.S.  (and so on for higher floors). Was it a custom imported into the U.S. from a different culture?

Related:"Ground floor" vs. "first floor".

user82734 · Answer

You can read this article and make your own assumption about why Americans use such a system:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storey#Numbering

In my opinion, when you use the word "floor", you should start from 1 (on the ground). Because you have a floor (surface) there, don't you? This is logical.

Mari-Lou A · Answer

The American convention is that the floor inside a building which is on the ground, is called the first floor and the floor above that is called the second floor and so forth.

Why the difference?

This is my theory:
The term ground doesn't need to be qualified, there is no such thing as a ‘second ground’ whereas any building can have one or more floors or storeys.  Neverless in many hotels, the first floor is often referred to as a lobby

First Floor/ Ground Floor
  In the US, the first floor of a building is also the ground floor, but
  in Europe the first floor is the floor above the ground floor, and the
  second floor is the one above that. This is important information for
  novice American travelers trying to find their hotel rooms.
   Paul Brians’ Common Errors in English Usage

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Images from English Club.com

An American native speaker on Word Reference writes

We use "ground floor" and "first floor" interchangeably. If you walk
  up a flight of stairs, you reach the second floor, whether you call
  the floor you started on the ground floor or the first.

Similarly on a different English language forum, a native speaker confirms

In the US, “ground floor” and “first floor” mean the same thing and
  are used interchangeably. Usually elevator buttons marked ‘B1’, ‘B2’
  etc. do indeed refer to “basement”. Sometimes they will say ‘LL1’,
  ‘LL2’, which stands for “lower level” (but still means “basement”.)

kiwi-ian · Answer

I was taught (Anglo New Zealander with 20 years in Europe) that
a) a building has a floor on the ground, the ground floor
b) an additional floor is added and it's the first [extra] floor. BTW this will have to have a proper structure rather than beaten earth which many ground floors used to be when animals lived on the ground floor and the people lived above. So "first" would also refer to the first separate structure of a floor.
Just as logical as any other numbering system.

First floor vs ground floor, usage origin

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