I think it is a good trait that you care enough about your work to feel this much frustration. Change though, is often hard to achieve because people tend to be stubborn. To provide more useful feedback I think you should mention what is expected from you at work. Are you supposed to be working on new features in this project or just maintainence?
Regardless of the exact situation, there should always be a way for you to work on your craft. It sounds like you are doing a lot of refactoring now and that could be quite rewarding, even without tests. If you find yourself trying hard to improve the environment and feel like it is to no avail and that no one is listening, while simultaneously feeling like you can’t leave the job in the short term, you might want to think about how to take advantage of the dead time at work to learn new things or do other activities that improve your skills.
Regardless of the exact situation, there should always be a way for you to work on your craft. It sounds like you are doing a lot of refactoring now and that could be quite rewarding, even without tests. If you find yourself trying hard to improve the environment and feel like it is to no avail and that no one is listening, while simultaneously feeling like you can’t leave the job in the short term, you might want to think about how to take advantage of the dead time at work to learn new things or do other activities that improve your skills.