Managers do value the value of solving technical debt, because ultimately these changes maintain and improve the ability to deliver features. The problem is the

Managers do value the value of solving technical debt, because ultimately these changes maintain and improve the ability to deliver features. The problem is they often are unable to see how technical improvements affect the capacity to deliver. It doesn't help that developers also sometimes can't see it, and make mistakes overengineering or improving something that is of little value. In this sense it is a bit like the prevention paradox during the pandemic. If you are successful in preventing an outbreak, people will hate you for it because most people only feel the pain of the measures they had to take, and the absence of an outbreak only shows them those measures were useless. Then, to worsen things, there are also genuine mistakes in handling the pandemic and those are forever used as proof the measures are useless and its proponents incompetent. It really takes a lot of discernment to cut through all this.