"I prefer my products to have less code in them." -- Can't remember what smarter person than I said it...

Conceptually, I think every developer eventually realizes that every line of code ends up adding maintenance cost, and potentially constraints on the future. "Technical Debt" is one way to think about it - if you don't have the resources to maintain. Otherwise, it's just a cost as others have pointed out.

Maintenance is harder than most people think: documentation, translations, tests, all are part of this cost.