According to certain embodiments, a method is disclosed for operating a user equipment. The method comprises transmitting or receiving a transmission on at least one of the component carriers, wherein the at least one component carrier is associated with a slot duration that corresponds to a numerology of the component carrier. The transmitting or receiving on the at least one of the component carriers is based on a relation between a number of information bits on the at least one of the component carriers over one or more reference slot durations and a reference data rate.