Technical debt is only half the ledger. The other half is software capital: reusable, tested, portable assets that make every future project cheaper. Merely reducing debt gets you to zero – building capital is what compounds above it.

Tools that hold your designs hostage have no future. Vendor lock-in through proprietary IDEs, build systems and code generators is a strategic risk – and software capital denominated in a proprietary currency devalues at the vendor's convenience.

AI amplifies whatever it finds. On a modern foundation – standard tooling, sharp abstractions, automated guard-rails – AI multiplies your returns. Without one, it merely helps you take out loans faster.