Abstract: In recent years,“anti-corruption”has been an important topic in the field of Chinese economy.This paper empirically examines the relationships between senior executives?? payment and the probability of their corruption, based on a sample of 1,415 listed companies in China’s Shanghai and Shenzhen A share markets in 2007—2014. The study found that, different relationships exist between their high payments and overt corruption or hidden corruption. In the aspect of overt corruption, the correlation between payment and corruption is significantly negative, which suggests high payment restrains corruption, or in an other word, the higher the payment, the lower the probability of overt corruption. And in hidden corruption, the correlation is significantly positive , which means high payment encourages corruption, or, the higher the payment, the higher the probability of hidden corruption. The study also found that compared with non-state-owned enterprises, the phenomenon of ‘high payment restraining corruption’is more evident in state-owned enterprises.

Key words: executive payment, high payment restraining corruption, anti-corruption