# Unnecessary vspace for align/equation when it's first on page

I'm using the align environment and now I have the problem that one of my formulas is the first object on a page with some vspace before it. But this looks a bit odd, because it isn't in line with the text of the previous page. Trying to use \vspace{-xcm} seems to have no effect. The same holds true for the equation environment, but there with not so much vspace.

How could I delete this unnecessary vspace and align the formula on top of the page where normal text would be?

MWE

\documentclass[12pt,a4paper,twoside]{scrbook}

\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage{amsfonts}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\usepackage{mathtools}

\begin{document}
\lipsum[1-3]
\newpage
\lipsum[1-3]
\newpage
\begin{align}
\intertext{Objective function}
\min x \\
\intertext{s.t.}
x < 5 \\
x > 2
\end{align}
\end{document}

• \vspace*{-\baselineskip}\vspace*{-\abovedisplayskip}; but it's better not starting a paragraph (or a page) with a display. – egreg Feb 15 '15 at 19:09
• A page hardly ever start with a formula. So why are you doing this in the first place? – daleif Feb 15 '15 at 19:23
• @daleif I shortened my question. The long version is a mathematical program with an align environment starting with a \shorttext{} command. So the page doesn't really start with a formula but with that text followed by the objective function. I could have exclude that text from the align environment, but I wanted to keep them together in one environment. – user2653422 Feb 15 '15 at 23:06
• Please update the mwe to reflect this. I still do not see what the problem is. – daleif Feb 16 '15 at 7:55
• Drop Objective... outside. \intertext is meant to be between lines, thus there is spacing above and below. Besides, generally a displayed equation should not start a page, which is why LaTeX goes to great length for that not to happen. – daleif Feb 16 '15 at 9:09

You shouldn't be using \intertext to start the display. And you're better using \shortintertext in the second case, in order to reduce the vertical spacing.

\documentclass[12pt,a4paper,twoside]{scrbook}

\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage{mathtools}
\usepackage{amssymb}
\usepackage{lipsum}

\begin{document}
\lipsum[1-3]
\newpage
\lipsum[1-3]
\newpage
Objective function
\begin{align}
\min x \\
\shortintertext{s.t.}
x < 5 \\
x > 2
\end{align}
\end{document}


A display should never start a paragraph (nor be the first thing on a page).