The author Paolo Bacigalupi has a great sci-fi story set in the Gulf Coast of the near future, centering on a teenage boy who works as the titular Ship Breaker [1].
Even though it is technically “young adult” fiction, I found plenty to enjoy for this middle-aged reader.
His novel The Water Knife is also excellent and more “grown up.”
I enjoyed ship breaker too. Didn't realise it was the first of a trilogy. The windup girl was good too, although I found the coal power and other steampunk stuff a little distracting.
Bacigalupi wrote another book called Pump Six and Other Stories. If you enjoy scrappunk then the story "The People of Sand and Slag" from that collection is pretty good.
I don't know the solution to modern ship breaking, but I think we have it in us to be better. We don't want to be the people of sand and slag. Let's instead be characters from a Becky Chambers novel.
Even though it is technically “young adult” fiction, I found plenty to enjoy for this middle-aged reader.
His novel The Water Knife is also excellent and more “grown up.”
[1] https://windupstories.com/books/ship-breaker/