Method and apparatus for resource allocation

A network device includes queues for queuing packets, and functional circuitry to provide a processing resource to be shared by the queues. Further, the network device includes a first-in-first-out (FIFO) selection circuit that receives tokens respectively associated with the queues. The FIFO selection circuit buffers and outputs the tokens in a first-in-first-out manner. When a token is output by the FIFO selection circuit, a queue associated with the token is selected to provide a packet for the functional circuitry to process. When a queue associated with an output token having at least a second packet in the queue after the queue outputs a first packet, the FIFO selection circuit re-buffers the output token associated with the queue to permit the queue to output the second packet once the output token associated with the queue is again output by the FIFO selection circuit.