But then that was many years ago.

But you could actually buy something for a quarter in those days - a comic book, a soda and a Milky Way.

at the pre-school, you should charge a rate that reflects that experience. Don't undervalue yourself. Just remember that you are taking care of their most precious "commodity" ~ they should recognize that and respond accordingly. Thus, I'd suggest $12 - 15/hour for 1 child, and add a couple of dollars/hour for more than one.

No one could afford what I'm actually worth.

However, I want to be reasonable to the point that people will hire me to do something I actually love (and have done for free for some). I enjoy it, I have the time, and I'm not trying to pay bills with the money.

I'm asking because there seems to be a huge range.

that and all the requests for sitting I've been getting. Some may think $4.00 is unreasonable but if you like doing it and you have the time and you are helping someone, why not?

As the 3 week old doesn't do much more then poop, eat and sleep, I can still get the cooking, paying bills, and much of the house work done while watching him.

And as my income is SSDI and a small VA pension, the extra $300-$400 from babysitting a month is quite an increase in disposable income.

...mid-1960s. When I first started, I remember my mother suggesting that I only charge 45 cents an hour - can't remember why. I was able to convince her that this would make the math too much of a pain in the ass for the parents.

For some interesting perspective here, when the peds practice I work for decided they wanted me to start doing after hours on-call (phone only - we never go into the office once the work day is done) they proposed the following rates:

$50 for a week night (5 PM to 8 AM the next morning)
$75 for a Saturday (noon to 8 AM on Sunday)
$100 for all day Sunday (24 hours)

According to most salary surveys, about 75% of nurse practitioners either don't take after hours call at all, or just until 10 PM . I did the math on this proposal, and pointed out to my employers that this equaled about $4 an hour to cover all 3 of our offices - any of a few thousand families could call and need advice on potentially serious medical situations. I said, "Baby sitters get paid more than that to look after just a couple of kids."

That plan was promptly dropped. We compromised on 5-10 PM 3 weeknights a month, and a Sunday morning 8-12 PM, also once a month. $15 an hour. I think they are getting a hell of a bargain. I know physicians generally like to say that they do not get paid for being on call, that it is "just part of the job," but I feel fairly certain that the salaries they negotiate somehow factor on call hours into the compensation package somehow.

and I can see where you would want to charge more. The potential for a lot of work is there.