More difficult tasks on the quantitative scale require readers to perform an arithmetic operation where the quantities and/or the operation are not easily determined. One such task involves a compound interest table. It directs the reader to "calculate the total amount of money you will have if you invest $100 at a rate of 6% for 10 years." This task received a difficulty value of 348, in part because many respondents treated it as a document rather than a quantitative task and simply looked up the amount of interest that would be earned. They forgot to add it to the initial investment of $100. Clearly, it was not the arithmetic of adding these two values together that increased difficulty. Rather, it was locating the correct amount of interest in the table and then knowing or inferring that it had to be added to the initial investment stated in the directive. As a result, operation specificity received a code of 6, type of match was scored 2, plausibility of distractor was scored 3, and type of calculation was scored 1 because the reader had only to add to decimal numbers.

Another task at this level requires respondents to read a newspaper article describing a research finding linking allergies to a particular genetic mutation. The question directs the reader to calculate the number of people studied who were found to have a mutant gene. To answer the question correctly the respondent had to know how to set up the problem with the information given. That is, they had to know they needed to convert the phrase "64 percent" to a decimal number and then multiply it by the number of persons studied. The short newspaper article provided no clues on how to set up this problem. As a result, type of calculation was coded 3 because it involved a multiplication, and operation specificity was coded 6 because it required the reader to convert to a decimal and to infer the operation that was needed. Type of match and plausibility of distractor each received a code of 1.

One of the most difficult quantitative literacy tasks directs the reader to look at a table providing nutritional analysis of food and then, using the information given, determine the percentage of calories in a Big Mac® that comes from total fat. This task was at 381 on the scale as a result of how readers responded to this task. To answer this question, readers first must cycle through a long table with lots of distractors to identify the correct numbers needed for this task. Next, they must recognize that the information about total fat is provided in grams. Therefore, they must convert the number of fat grams to calories before calculating this number of calories as a percentage of the total calories given for a Big Mac®. As a result, type of match and plausibility of distractor each received a code of 4. Type of calculation was scored a 5 because the task required multiple calculations, and operation specificity received a score of 9 because of the inferencing needed to discern the features of the problem and to set it up correctly.