BOULDER — It’s been said more young people believe they have a better chance of seeing a UFO than seeing a dime from Social Security.

But the pros are still more optimistic about the program’s future. Three Boulder financial planners all believe Social Security is here to stay, but they’re also unsure how it will change in years to come.

“My own feeling is that Social Security is in better shape than a lot of people give it credit for,´ said Stuart Farnell, a personal financial adviser in Boulder. Gary Shirman, a partner with Advanced Financial Consultants, agrees. “Our feeling here is that it’s going to be around in some fashion,” Shirman said, but adds it’s very difficult to project in what form the program will exist years from now.

Amy Noel, a certified financial planner with Linsco Private Ledger, encourages clients to “focus on things we have control over” and treat Social Security benefits as “gravy over the top,” not the main course a young person will feast upon in retirement.

And while there is uncertainty about what the program will look like when today’s 20-somethings retire, young people can get a glimpse of what their future payments might be.

Rich Gonzales is the regional commissioner for the Social Security Administration. He said anyone over age 25 can request a statement of future retirement benefits by going to the agency’s Web site at www.ssa.gov.

Gonzales said the statement can help people in their design of a retirement plan, as it gives them a ballpark estimate of what they’ll receive in retirement. He cautions that the statements tend to err on the conservative side. The statement is based on a worker’s earnings from the previous year and “assumes that earnings are going to stay the same (until retirement), which is probably not the case” for a young person, Gonzales said.

“The younger you are, the more likely that the retirement estimate is going to be an understatement of what your future benefit would be,” Gonzales said. Still, the report can give a young person some foundation for putting together a financial plan for their future.

So what comes after that? Financial advisers say a couple factors are affecting retirement planning and make it all the more important for young people to begin saving as soon as possible for their older years.

“Work life expectancy is contracting, meaning we’re working less and less and less,” Noel said. Meanwhile, “life expectancy is expanding; we’re in retirement longer and longer.”

So while we’re working less and retiring earlier, we’re living longer in retirement, and apparently, living it up. An old rule in financial planning was that you needed 70 to 80 percent of your pre-retirement income to live comfortably in retirement. But that no longer applies to many of today’s retirees, and probably not for those of tomorrow, either. “For a lot of our clients, they’re spending more in retirement because they’ve got more time. They’re doing more travel and recreation,” Shirman said.

Farnell agrees. “I don’t see my clients reducing their expenditures. They go off around the world and play golf and do all kinds of fun things, and for the most part, they’re spending as much as they were spending before retirement,” he said.

So if a young person wants to retire young and in style, he’s got his work cut out for him. All three planners recommend that the first step is to contribute the maximum allowed to company pension plans such as 401ks and other tax-deferred retirement vehicles such as individual retirement accounts.

But for some young workers, even that may not be enough. That’s when a financial plan comes in. Farnell recommends people save at least 10 percent of their gross annual income; Shirman said he’s more comfortable with 15 percent.

Noel hesitates to give a such a figure, saying it varies according to client needs. “My general feeling is you save as much as you can and you don’t regret it; nobody ever comes back to me and says, ?You know, darn, I saved too much.'” She also says it’s vital that you spend less than you make, and that you follow that old rule: Pay yourself first.

Noel, Shirman, and Farnell agree on some other basics. They all say that yearly or even monthly swings in the stock market have to be ignored; young people have to take a long-term outlook when investing.

Farnell likes the Treasury’s Series I bonds, which are indexed to the rate of inflation and guarantee a 4 percent rate of return. Bond dividends can be tax-deferred, too. Farnell recommends putting funds that might be needed in an emergency in these bonds.

Shirman said one big mistake young investors make is taking too much risk. He urges clients to hold a diverse set of investments and not “put all your money in some dot-com or a large chunk of it,” and risk loosing it.

Simply not saving is the biggest mistake of all. Noel said the savings rate in the United States now stands below 5 percent; but she adds, “It’s never too late; it’s better to start early, but don’t be disappointed if you’re 30 and you’re just doing it.”