A method includes identifying multiple communication paths extending from a source device and for each path, determining a data rate, a power level used to communicate over at least a portion of the path and a power per data rate value by dividing the power level by the data rate. One of the multiple communication paths is selected such that the selected communication path has the lowest power per data rate value given quality of service requirements of an application. The power per data rate can be optimized from the device perspective as well as an overall network perspective. A message is then sent over the selected communication path.