5-year-old breaks his nanny's $2000 laptop, parents refuse to pay her for the damages: 'I feel like this is absolutely not my responsibility.'

They should at least pay for half of it

When you're babysitting or petsitting, you need to be smart about exactly where you put your possessions. Kids and animals are not always the most considerate of the fact that you spend a lot of money on your jewelry, and do not appreciate it if someone breaks or chews it. Depending on their age, a kid might not even realize that a bracelet belongs to you, not them, and that can create a world of trouble if you're not careful about where you put it. 

The volatility of children raises the question: Is it the parents' responsibility to cover any and everything their child breaks, or should a nanny responsible for their care take the blame when something breaks under their watch? The answer to that question is contingent on what was broken. If a kid breaks their parents' Fabergé egg while they were supposed to be under a babysitter's watchful eye, their parents are almost certainly going to place the blame on the babysitter and maybe even ask her to pay them back for the damage. But if a kid breaks their babysitter's phone by stealing it out of their pocket and throwing it on the floor, it wouldn't be a wild request for the babysitter to ask the parents to cover the cost of the phone. After all, a nanny can only do so much to morally guide kids in the right direction. If their parents tolerate disrespect for their possessions from their own children, what's going to stop their kids from doing the same thing to other people?