because the child just slept the whole time and she just did homework. If the baby cried the whole time, I'm sure the parents would have paid her a bit more. So sometimes it's situational, and we often paid a floor of $4/hour just to make it worth their while to come, so really our rate was usually between $4-6/hour depending on whether it was 1-3 kids (by four kids, our oldest could babysit). But if the baby is just going to sleep ... you don't really need to pay the sitter that much to sit there and do homework or watch tv.