It's not about skills. It's about taste. Nothing wrong with getting someone else to do a cover or two. The question is whether the author had even the judgement to ask someone else for better work (in their taste). Same for typesetting. Same for proofreading.

And then there's the french publishers who prefer a text-only cover (and minimal at that) as a matter of their taste (and I guess, expectations of their customers - since not all french publishers go text-only).