That is the problem with the tech debt analogy. There are many times you can get away with dirty code with no costs. I wasted time before cleaning up code only

That is the problem with the tech debt analogy. There are many times you can get away with dirty code with no costs. I wasted time before cleaning up code only for it to be dropped or for the code not needing any additional updates for over 5 years. You can't always anticipate tech debt in advance so it often better to leave the quick and dirty solution and revisit if it becomes painful to update in the future.