The appeal window for a denied workers’ compensation claim in Michigan is typically 90 days — a deadline Kevin Stanton nearly missed while trying to keep his barbershop alive on less than $1,800 a month.
I first connected with Kevin through a veterans’ support group on Detroit’s east side, where he had stood up during an open-share portion of a March 2026 meeting and laid out his situation without flinching: a declining business, a denied insurance claim, medical debt he couldn’t touch, and zero retirement savings at age 30. The group coordinator passed along his contact, and two weeks later I sat across from him at a folding table in the back of his shop on Gratiot Avenue, the low hum of clippers carrying through from the front room.
Kevin Stanton is not someone who asks for help easily. He served two years in the Army Reserve after graduating high school in 2014, came back to Detroit, and spent the next several years apprenticing across three different shops before opening his own place in 2021. “I always thought if I just worked hard enough, I could outrun whatever came at me,” he told me. At 30, he is finding out that’s not always true.
A Business on the Decline Before the Injury Hit
Kevin’s shop was never flush, but it was functional. At its peak in late 2022, he was pulling in roughly $3,400 a month in gross revenue — enough to cover booth rent, supplies, and a modest personal income after expenses. By mid-2024, that number had slipped to around $2,200. By January 2025, it was closer to $1,750.
The drop wasn’t caused by any single event. Foot traffic thinned after a nearby anchor store closed, a handful of loyal clients relocated to the suburbs, and a chain barbershop opened three blocks away offering online booking and extended evening hours. “I was already fighting,” Kevin said. “The injury just — it came at the worst possible time.”
In November 2024, a repetitive strain injury in Kevin’s right wrist — aggravated when a client shifted unexpectedly mid-cut and the clippers twisted hard against his grip — put him out of full commission for nearly six weeks. He filed a workers’ compensation claim in December 2024. In February 2025, it was denied.
The denial cited insufficient documentation establishing that the acute incident, rather than a pre-existing repetitive strain condition, caused the impairment. Kevin had no private attorney. He had no health insurance. He had a growing stack of bills from a Detroit urgent care clinic and an orthopedic specialist totaling approximately $5,200.
The Workers’ Comp Denial and What Came Next
Michigan workers’ compensation appeals must typically be filed within 90 days of a denial order with the Michigan Workers’ Compensation Agency. Kevin learned that deadline not from the claims adjuster or any official notice, but from a fellow veteran at the support group who had navigated the same system two years earlier.
Kevin filed an appeal in April 2025, just inside the window. As of our conversation in March 2026, that appeal is still pending — now more than eleven months in. In the meantime, he has been operating at roughly 60 percent of his prior capacity, cutting hair with a brace on his wrist and turning away clients who want detail work requiring sustained rotation.
Without employer-sponsored health coverage — self-employed shop owners are not automatically enrolled in any plan — Kevin paid out of pocket for most of his treatment and deferred two follow-up specialist appointments he says he still hasn’t rescheduled. According to SSA.gov’s disability benefits overview, workers with long-term impairments that prevent substantial gainful activity may qualify for SSDI, but Kevin’s situation sits in a gray zone: he is still working, just at reduced capacity and output.
SNAP as a Lifeline — and the Stigma Kevin Had to Push Through
By spring 2025, Kevin’s net monthly income had dropped to somewhere around $900 after shop expenses. He qualified for SNAP benefits under federal income thresholds — in 2025, the gross monthly income limit for a single-person household was approximately $1,580. A case worker at a Detroit community resource center helped him navigate the application.
He was approved in May 2025 for $281 per month in SNAP benefits. The approval didn’t feel like a win, at least not at first.
Kevin is not an outlier in this regard. According to Benefits.gov, SNAP eligibility for self-employed individuals is based on net self-employment income after allowable business expenses — a detail that causes many small business owners to assume they don’t qualify when they actually do. Kevin’s gross revenue appeared higher on paper than his real take-home once booth rent, supplies, equipment maintenance, and utilities were subtracted.
The $281 a month freed up enough breathing room that Kevin stopped skipping meals and was able to keep his phone and utilities current. He has not, however, resumed the specialist appointments his orthopedist recommended. The medical bills, now partially in collections, remain unresolved.
The Tax Blind Spot That Cost Him Twice
When I asked Kevin about taxes, he exhaled slowly and looked at the ceiling. Self-employment tax — the 15.3 percent levy that covers both the employee and employer shares of Social Security and Medicare contributions — had been quietly blindsiding him since he opened in 2021.
“The first year I owed like $2,100 at tax time. I had no idea that was coming,” he said. By 2024, he had improved at setting aside quarterly estimates, but the injury months threw off his projections again. He ended the 2024 tax year owing approximately $870, which he paid over several months in installments.
A volunteer preparer at a Detroit VITA (Volunteer Income Tax Assistance) site helped Kevin identify both the self-employment tax deduction and a home office deduction he had been leaving on the table for two years. According to the IRS credits and deductions page, these write-offs can meaningfully reduce a self-employed worker’s adjusted gross income. For Kevin, the combined deductions reduced his 2023 tax liability by roughly $340 — not life-altering, but real money when rent is due.
His VITA preparer also flagged that the approximately $5,200 in unreimbursed medical expenses from the wrist injury might qualify as itemized deductions, since only amounts exceeding 7.5 percent of adjusted gross income are deductible — and at Kevin’s income level, a significant portion of that bill likely clears the threshold. He hasn’t filed his 2025 return yet. That appointment is scheduled for late April 2026.
Where Kevin Stands Now — and What He’s Still Chasing
By March 2026, Kevin’s shop revenue had partially recovered to somewhere between $1,900 and $2,100 a month gross, helped in part by a mobile barbering side operation he launched in the fall — traveling to clients’ homes and offices on weekends. In his best months, that adds $400 to $500. He is also in conversations with a local vocational school about teaching a barbering skills elective, which would pay a small per-session stipend.
The retirement picture weighs on Kevin, even at 30. “I know I should be doing something about that,” he told me. “But how do you save for retirement when you’re not sure you can make rent?” According to SSA.gov’s retirement benefits section, self-employed workers build Social Security credits through taxes paid on net earnings — but those credits convert to meaningful retirement benefits only when earnings are consistent and substantial over time. Kevin’s irregular income history means his projected Social Security benefit at full retirement age is currently low.
The bigger picture is hard to frame as a success story, and Kevin doesn’t try to. He’s surviving, and he has found programs — SNAP, VITA tax assistance, the veterans’ network — that have provided real, tangible relief. But he is also still carrying a wrist injury he hasn’t fully treated, an unresolved appeal that is now nearly a year old, and $5,200 in bills that are beginning to show up as collections notices. “I’m not where I thought I’d be,” he said as I packed up my notes to leave. “But I’m still here.”
It’s a line that can land as triumphant or deflated, depending on the day you hear it. The afternoon I heard it, it sounded like both.
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