You said "see this article" re: how aria-label is not applicable to div elements, hence the second link which is the WAI-ARIA guide on labelling elements.
You also said that ARIA can't help with custom controls in that post, which is where the other links are applicable as they describe doing just that. I.e. using ARIA tags to implement tabs, accordions, etc. either with or without a framework library.
ARIA is a solution to a specific problem, not something that should be used on every site. HTML is accessible out of the box when semantic elements are used as intended. If you are using a div as a button, you probably aren't hand writing HTML. It is likely part of a library. Adding the necessary ARIA attributes benefits every site using the library. Your boiling the ocean analogy implies that every web developer needs to scatter ARIA attributes all over their code, which just isn't true.