Clients naturally have anxieties about having enough money in retirement, but they probably shouldn't worry so much.

For example, some believe that Social Security won't survive, but that's simply not the case, according to top experts who spoke at the AICPA Engage conference Tuesday in Las Vegas.

“Social Security is not going away,” said Michael Finke, professor of wealth management at the American College.

The solution to funding shortfalls will probably be a combination of higher taxes, lower cost-of-living adjustments and extending the age of eligibility, he said.

Even with no fix, “you actually still get more than 70 percent of your checks for the next 100 years,” said Michael Kitces, director of wealth management at Pinnacle Advisory Group. “That's the worst-case scenario. … For a lot of clients, the media has so overhyped the peril of Social Security that people don't fully understand” that fact.

“For younger people, [assuming] they're going to get 70 percent of their [Social Security] benefits [is] probably a reasonably conservative assumption,” said Wade Pfau, professor of retirement income at the American College.

Then there's the question of a safe withdrawal rate, given lower investment returns and longer life spans.

Kitces noted that the widely used 4 percent withdrawal rate is based on a portfolio with just large-cap U.S. stocks and intermediate government bonds. Adding more diversification has been shown to support higher withdrawal rates, he said.

“The other thing people forget about is how horrifically bad some of those scenarios were, where the 4 percent rule survives,” Kitces added. “The 4 percent rule works if you retire in 1929” thanks to the allocation to Treasurys.

Adjusting spending in retirement can also help save a portfolio.

“It takes remarkably modest adjustments to materially lift sustainable spending,” Kitces said.

Don't talk to clients about the probability of portfolio failure, talk instead about the probability of needing to adjust spending, Kitces said. “Then the question is, 'What kind of adjustment?'” That might be giving up the vacation home if things turn ugly; phrased that way, clients are OK with it.

“The reality is, if we had a really extended bear market, people are probably going to feel better spending less,” Finke said.

Even in normal times, clients don't spend what they did in their working years.

“A couple years ago, we followed retirees through retirement to see if they were actually spending down their assets in retirement,” Finke said. “What we found was for the most part, they're not spending down that money. … In the first few years of retirement, they spend about the same as the year before they retired, but then in inflation-adjusted terms, it goes down every single year.”

“For clients we've had for 20-plus years, we absolutely see that spending slowdown,” Kitces agreed.

In fact, advisors overall tend to have a self-selected group of lifetime savers, and getting them to spend in retirement can be a challenge.

Annuities can help these people, as well as those who might run short.

Wealthier clients won't feel guilty about spending the regular checks they get from an annuity, Finke said, and the regular income enhances growth assets.

“It's been known among economists that annuitization is the most efficient way to get [bond] income in retirement,” Finke said. “You can cover a pretty good chunk of that 4 percent rule with annuitized income … and that takes a lot of pressure off the remainder of your portfolio.”

Finke said that annuitizing about one-third of a portfolio will result in more assets after 12 years.

“The only disadvantage is, no one wants to buy an annuity,” Finke added.

But advisors should reconsider. Annuities, he said, are “criminally underused by financial advisors.”