One of the goals of tax system reform is to gradually increase the proportion of direct tax and optimize the structure of tax revenue on the premise of stabilizing tax burden. An important research question is whether the VAT reform causes the adjustment of the tax payment behavior of enterprises, and thus has an impact on the tax burden of enterprise income tax. If such an influence path exists, it means that in addition to tax legislation, indirect tax reform itself has a linkage effect on direct taxes. Based on the trade-off theory of tax avoidance, this paper uses a staggered DID model to study the impact of VAT rate simplification reform in 2017 and 2018 on corporate income tax avoidance. The findings are as follows: After the VAT rate simplification reform, enterprises significantly reduce the degree of tax avoidance. The increase of corporate cash retention, the financial pressure of local governments, and the intensity of tax enforcement are the important mechanisms of VAT rate simplification reform affecting corporate income tax avoidance. The inhibition effect of VAT rate simplification reform on corporate tax avoidance is more significant in enterprises with a higher VAT tax burden rate, stronger competitiveness, and greater financing constraints. Moreover, enterprises not only reduce the book-tax different tax avoidance, but also reduce the book-tax conforming tax avoidance. The research findings reveal the linkage effect between indirect tax system and income tax system, expand the study of corporate income tax avoidance, and also reveal the policy effect of VAT rate simplification from the perspective of tax system linkage. The research revelation is that deepening VAT tax reduction reform is conducive to getting closer to VAT tax neutrality and optimizing tax structure, and favorable tax burden policies are conducive to guiding enterprises to proactively improve tax compliance.