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Uhh, what caching advantage are you talking about? Everything that can be served cached over HTTP can also be served cached over HTTPS. Unless you are talking about a caching proxy outside of the website control. In that case, they aren't needed, CDNs solved that problem in a much better way.

> Unless you are talking about a caching proxy outside of the website control. In that case, they aren't needed, CDNs solved that problem in a much better way.

There are still parts of the world where caching proxies are used to conserve limited transit bandwidth; CDNs don't solve that.

"Everything that can be served cached over HTTP can also be served cached over HTTPS. "

Only if you're taking about a browser cache. Any other cache couldn't intercept the data and cache it without alerting the browser (unless you mess around with installing SSL certs).

I wonder if even simply the overhead of setting up and encrypting the secure connections even just by itself has a measurable effect on people's buying behavior.

Yes but the "login" link, the "add to cart" link, etc. is all served over http so could be replaced by a MITM.