Hey, it works though! I was a radio DJ back in the late 80's when things were switching from vinyl to CD. We had a turntable w/ a bad tone arm and with all equipment funds being channelled to new 'high tech' equipment there wasn't any left to fix it or replace the table. Our audio engineer...
Along with everything else mentioned, groove wear also can cause skipping. If your record is clean, fairly straight (not warped) and you get a lot of skipping, wear and tear on the vinyl itself is probably the cause. If your turntable is as cheap as you say it is, I'm assuming there aren't...