Abstract: The reinforced concrete frame structures resist progressive collapse through the floor systems consisting of slabs and beams. The progressive collapse resistance of the floor systems under small deformation is provided by the compressive arch action of slabs and beams. The existing theoretical macro-model of the compressive arch action is complicated, involving many parameters but ignoring the influence of the slabs; as a result, the existing model is not feasible for the practical engineering design. Based on the micro-mechanism of the floor system, this paper establishes an analytical model of the progressive collapse resistance of the beam-slab substructures under the compressive arch mechanism. Compared with the existing model, the proposed model significantly reduces the number of the parameters and thus simplifies the formula to calculate the progressive collapse resistance. In addition, the interaction of the slabs and beams in resisting progressive collapse can be considered by this model. Through a comparison with the experimental results including 47 beam specimens and 6 beam-slab substructure specimens, it is found that the accuracy of the proposed model in calculating the beam specimens is comparable to the existing model. In addition, the calculating accuracy for the beam-slab specimens is improved significantly. This study provides a reference for the practical engineering design of the reinforced concrete frame structures to resist progressive collapse.