The holiday season is normally a time when consumer spending, or in microeconomics terms "demand", increases.  This was not the case in December 2011, however.  According to The Huffington Post, consumer spending by .1 percent in December when inflation is taken into account.  They state that news that the holiday season was big, was overhyped and not factual.  One reason given as to why even though December was not a bad month for the economy, is that consumer spending declined and did not keep up with the production of goods is because the jobs that were created were primarily minimum wage jobs.
This leads me into analyzing this event from our knowledge of microeconomics.  In this case, the demand curve shifted inward as the "real wages" of consumers continued to fall.  Since consumers are making less, they have a lower disposable income, which means that the demand curve will shift inward.  This is also shown by the fact that much of the overhyping for the holiday season was caused by consumers buying goods at much lower prices.  This also correlates with our knowledge of microeconomics, because as the demand curve shifts inward, the point of equilibrium will change and be at a lower price.  Eventually one would expect that either the supply of goods will be lowered, or income will rise and the equilibrium point will shift back closer to where it has been previously.  This event should not cause panic that the economy is failing however, as the "real wages" actually rose a bit in December, but consumers put more of it towards savings.  This illustrates another concept,that of opportunity cost.  For many consumers, saving some of their income was worth more to them, then purchasing more goods.  Therefore, the opportunity cost to purchase goods fell.  My prediction is that after a period of time when consumers save a decent portion of their income, they will decide their savings are high enough and they will go back to their normal purchasing habits.

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/30/illusory-holiday-shopping-spending-december-2011_n_1241238.html?ref=business