http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/rational/library/edge/09/jun09/designdebteconomics/index.html
A good post on technical debt - " Design debt economics: A vocabulary for describing the causes, costs, and cures for software maintainability problems"
The author recommends the book - Clean Code; A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship. (http://www.amazon.com/Clean-Code-Handbook-Software-Craftsmanship/dp/0132350882)