Yep. I've found that the ticket or tech debt isn't important until it becomes on fire and must be fixed ASAP. It doesn't matter that the possibility for the bug to happen has existed for 2 years, the organization doesn't find the investment worth it until it's burning down the house.

I feel like the dynamic still holds true. If the team was underfunded two years ago, and still underfunded one year ago, they will probably still be underfunded with regard to tackling the problem now. The ROI argument seems similarly dubious since it might hold true for things with high upfront costs but otherwise if the perceived ROI had been high then a team short on resources would have already prioritized it.