[jrochkind1]

> In 20 years and several different companies I have always heard this but never agreed with it.

Do you mean your companies didn't act like maintenance was last on the list, you didn't agree with descriptions that said they would?

Or they indeed did, you just didn't agree this was appropriate, you thought they were acting inappropriately?

Because you seem to be describing environments where indeed maintenance was not valued by the business -- you just didn't like it. So to "say maintenance is not valued by the business" is just to describe reality, like you in fact just did.

I think the common saying that "maintenance is the last on the list" is not meant to be a prescription, advocating this -- it's a description of what seems to happen. Analyzing why and if there's a way for a different approach to be better for the business is not something OP engages in. One would hope so if one, like you, values things working and being high quality... but if very vew companies act this way, there's probably a reason regarding alignent of interests...

[CRConrad]

I'm fairly certain the GP didn't mean the saying "maintenance is the last on the list" is a prescription. AFAICS their point was simply that it's not even an a valid description of reality; their experience is the opposite.