Imagine a label, one that reads: "An actual, living, breathing human used their own hands to help make this product." This is just what the (western) world needs, a label affixed to consumer goods. We need this urgent reminder because in those seconds when we decide to purchase another piece of life's apparatus we are strikingly effective at suppressing any ethical doubt over its provenance.

The first thing we do (with varying levels of awareness) is convince ourselves that – from the hottest bits of sleek hi-tech gadgetry to highly embellished fashion garments – these were made by very clever robot arms that can apply toxic chemicals to a touch screen or expertly sew a sequin or bead. But as today's Observer report on Apple products lays bare, our consumer goods still arrive courtesy of the blood, sweat and tears of many human beings.

The Global Assembly Line is a misnomer for a dystopian, complex jumble of production that uses any number of countries and its citizens. Environmentalists are already aware that the price tag on most mass global consumer products already fails to factor in the true ecological cost ("natural capital") of the product.

From elements in mobile phones to leather in trainers, all are habitually "subsidised" by the environment. Furthermore, with electronics, ethical arguments have tended to focus on the end of the chain, where consumer behaviour conspires with Moore's Law (the amount of computing power that can be bought for a certain amount of money doubles every 18 months) and planned obsolescence to create mountains of e-waste.

But today's report reveals the human capital that is also squandered. No supply chain so dependent on workers should be breathtakingly intolerant of any of their needs. What's more, and to put it bluntly, it is hard to find any robot (given research and development costs and maintenance) which matches humans working on the global supply chain on a pure cost basis. In this sense, humans are very "cheap".

It's now over 100 years on from the Triangle Shirtwaist fire in New York, which killed 149 workers in the garment district and led to better labour laws, but still workers in the developing world are dying in similar incidents. However, the "quirks" within a global assembly line which make worker suffering at best likely and at worst inevitable are beginning to receive more attention.

The habitual use of unpaid, enforced overtime is common across many sectors. In the fashion industry, garment workers are effectively set up to fail. When a multinational places an order at the behest of a buyer the workers are set quotas to meet the order. Professor Doug Miller, an expert on the garment supply chain and workers' rights, has identified a discrepancy between the estimated and real time taken for a garment worker to complete an order. So the multinational buyer's calculations are based on standard minute values (SMVs) – virtual minutes based on a factory that operates at near 100% efficiency.

However, in countries such as Cambodia (the British high street is heavily reliant on Cambodian production), the efficiency of factories rarely rises above 30%. Garment workers can therefore work flat out without any hope of meeting their targets within their paid working hours. At this point, they are forced to work overtime and sometimes gates may be shut or locked (including the fire escapes).

In the world of consumer electronics, the pressure to work overtime appears to have been caused by the sheer popularity of new products. Whipped into a frenzy by marketing and favourable product reviews, we consumers shriek for the latest gadgetry and the factories must oblige.

It's worth reading the testimonies that tell us what life as a "techno-serf" is really like. A clue: it's totally at odds with the liberating, blue-sky, wireless possibilities offered by the sleek phones and laptops. The words: "Twelve hours of work = standard" and: "One year and I'm dead" were recently found in the notebook of a young man who had been working for a famous electronics brand in South Chungcheong province before he took his own life. We are beginning to hear of intense worker despondency and depression. It's really about time we listened. These stories help to blunt the usual retorts of: "It gives them jobs" or: "They are just having their industrial revolution now." They also remind us that this is a battle for human decency and that if the price of a product is to condemn fellow humans to grab a few hours sleep cheek by jowl in a concrete dormitory for a pittance, that is surely too high a price.

As consumers, we still tend to be most receptive to the voices of brand spokespeople. Time after time, we trust their soothing words: "We're working on these challenges", "We've been let down badly by a supplier", "These are not our values" etc and placated by their corporate social responsibility reports. Robert Reich warns in his recent book, Supercapitalism, corporate social responsibility is "as meaningful as cotton candy".

But Reich's ultimate position is that we should stop expecting corporations to do the right thing. And I can't see any way of absolving the consumer of responsibility. I used to advocate going through a sort of consumerist catechism before making any consumer purchasing decision. Who made this product? Why did they make it? Why do I need it? I feel as if I urgently need to return to this way of buying. An understanding of the provenance of the product is key.

Given the global supply chain's scattergun approach to production, this means that product labels revealing even an outline of the origins of an average possession would need to be as long as cows' tongues. A small price to pay. Too much information is currently hushed up while multinationals cite competitive confidentiality as the reason for lack of transparency. Neither should we be put off the scent as consumers by the greening of companies and brands. It is far easier for multinationals to be green than address labour rights. But environmental and social justice must go together.

It has to be said that we don't help ourselves as consumers. Sometimes, the aesthetics and cool of a product eclipse the ethics so thoroughly that we are pathetically seduced.

As you probably suspect, I'm typing this on a MacBook Air. US writer Wendell Berry says: "The global economy institutionalises a global ignorance, in which producers and consumers cannot know or care about one another, and in which the histories of all products will be lost. In such a circumstance, the degradation of products and places, producers and consumers is inevitable." Yes, these products make hypocrites of us all.