Nested tables worked, but they were incredibly hard to write/edit by hand. This gives us a way of using those layout concepts while still maintaining some separation of document structure and layout definition.

CSS2 (from 10 years ago) is equal in power to HTML tables. (The display:table-* properties are based directly on the layout model of HTML tables. For better or worse - they are also somewhat underspecified like HTML tables was.)

These new proposals are much more powerful. Most notably they allow you to visually place elements in a grid independent of the source-order. CSS2 (and HTML table markup) does not allow that, ie. visually adjacent cells must also be adjacent in the HTML.

Stable Tables ♥ Datatree structure

Why is my CSS/webdesign intellectualized into a math problem?

Is it wrong tables work and feel like building blocks?

WYSIWYG enabled full sight.

Some walls privilege CSS.

Internet anyone can build?

Anyone can build a table.

</tables>

<div style"TL;DR">Tables fit WYSIWYG whereas CSS abstracts. Coding more WYSIWYG could ease.</div>

<!-- Join a table or float away? -->

</body>

</html>