Cause inkers just trace and letterers just cut and paste.
dumb
So, semi serious question. You saw a movement recently to get cover credit for colorists. People will often include colorists now, when naming off the creative team (in reviews, etc). But I don't really ever see any focus on inkers or letterers in the same way. Is there a reason for this? Why has the desire to expand the creative team seems to have stalled at the inclusion of colorists?
mmm, one answer is that it's easier for people not trained in art to recognize what constitutes as "good" colouring (especially now that we've gotten over the early/mid 2000's obsession with computer gradients for the most part and have that to contrast to) than it is to recognize what's good inking or good lettering (and really, "good" lettering should strive to be as unobtrusive as possible, it's only when you're doing really exceptional stuff guys like Workman/Bruzenak/Klein/Orzechowski were doing that you stand out).
As for inkers: the industry seems to have been moving away from dedicated inkers for a while now (with the exception of DC with dudes like Glapion/Miki on Capullo, Prado on Reis, and, of course, Klaus Motherfucking Janson on JRJR). In the meantime, the role of the colourist has unarguably eclipsed that of the inker in terms of maintaining a consistent visual aesthetic in recent years, especially at Marvel with their double shipping and rotating artists (c.f. Bettie Breitweiser's brilliant work on Captain America/Winter Soldier and Dean White on Uncanny X-Force v1) so it was disconcerting to see DC still not crediting them when pretty much everyone else did. Besides that: inkers already got cover credits and royalties, remember?
Also: Ales Kot and Kieron GIllen comics? They credit letterers on covers.