I think the point is that it's better to work on some 7 year old system hacked together without any craftsmanship with the belief that craftsmanship is nonsense and spaghetti code is a legitimate design pattern, than to work on it knowing there is a better way to design software.
Not as miserable as working on some 7 year old system hacked together without any craftsmanship. Plus if its a long term project the maintenance costs must spiral.